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In the Valley of Havilah 



















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IN THE 


VALLEY OF HAVILAH 


BY / 

FREDERICK THICKSTUN CLARK 

Author of ‘ l A Mexican Girl” etc . 


Strife is the father of all things . — Heraclitus. 


NEW YOKE : 


* c Right 

{ APR 24 1890 


FRANK F. LOVELL & COMPANY 

142-144 Worth Street. 


COPYRIGHT, 

Frederick Thickstun Clark. 

1890. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


CHAPTER I. 

This is the land of Havilah, compassed by the river 
Pison, “ where there is gold. ” 

Havilah is a name of so broad an application as to em- 
brace a superficies of several of California’s largest counties 
— so broad, indeed, as to render boundary lines vague 
even in the minds of those who know that country best 
and have travelled from one end of it to the other. The 
Havilah of the local maps is a small black dot, indicating 
a post-office, but men in other parts of the state who have 
mining stocks to sell never mention the black dot in con- 
nection with the interests and advantages of the region, 
except incidentally, as the point from which certain of the 
miners obtain supplies. The real Havilah is anywhere 
in the hills where gold is found, and a man may live in 
Havilah, yet be a hundred and fifty miles or more from 
the shabby little mining camp which bears that name. 
Havilah is generic and embraces a region, mountainous, 
campestrian, and fluvial, large enough and rich enough 
to have supported a powerful state in ancient times ; the 
Camp of Havilah is specific, and refers directly to the 
tumble-down mining village where the post-master and 
the saloon-keeper ply their respective callings in the midst 
of an unliterary and thirsty population. To the inquirer 


4 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


at a distance who professes to wish to visit the place, the 
locality is lumped indefinitely as the “Havilah District” 
or the “ Havilah Country ”, and from the descriptions of 
men who have been there the stranger, if he has an im- 
agination, furnishes his mind -with a cosmorama of land- 
scapes of truly Western amplitude, opening up infinitely 
varied vistas of broad plains and lofty mountains, of 
sunny slopes and gloomy canons, of rushing rivers and 
mighty forests which shake the air with low-toned melody; 
a shifting picture which, though made up largely of a 
kaleidoscopic interchange of color, is unlike other pictures 
in that it makes itself audible — almost sentient — in its 
moaning pines and sobbing waters. If our stranger is new 
to California and the paradoxes of the mountains, he will 
fill out his picture with details, calling them the fabri- 
cations of ingenious minds, with which the season of 
the year apparently has nothing to do, and conjure 
up an antipodal state of things in which roses bloom 
in snow-drifts and wild strawberries are gathered the 
year round ; and into these mixed conditions of tropical 
luxuriance and polar frost he will fuse a sense of 
sublime desolation, of the withdrawal of the world into 
a gray silence through whose inert soul inarticulate songs 
are striving for speech and utterance. It is all im- 
possible, contradictory. Now our stranger will see in 
his mind’s eye a landscape basking in the broad glare 
of noon-day, now shut in by the dusky luminousness of 
nights when stars throb big and warm in the near sky ; 
now presenting a bustling young camp of a few days’ 
growth, now a “petered out” town as desolate as the 
ruins of Babylon where the kings of Persia hunted wild 
beasts ; now a stretch of adobe desert ; now a blossom- 
ing tapestry of meadow-land undulating broadly down to 
a river ; now showing surges of daisies and iris blossoms, 
through which cattle wade flank-deep ; now gray as a 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH 


5 


dead face in the desolation of winter ; and darkened fit- 
fully in spring by processional clouds which trail their 
fringed robes along the mountain-tops and make earth 
and sky vibrate with the elemental music of thunder. 

If the stranger becomes curious and visits the place, 
he finds his picture by no means an exaggeration 
of the truth. One must see that land to know how 
wonderful, how beautiful, it is. In the presence of reality, 
description becomes mere poetic nonsense, words degen- 
erate into syntactical incoherencies. The dweller in the 
land of Havilah lives with a growing sense of his own 
littleness in this realm of epic possibilities, feeling that it 
should be peopled by genii and dragons ; he goes away 
enlarged by the consciousness that he has been the 
witness of unheard-of changes, the companion and inti- 
mate of stupendous physical forces, the friend of Nature’s 
secret, introspective moments. 

We are parts of the Infinite whole, pieces chipped off 
from the Infinite mind. Why should it be accounted a 
difficult thing to feel our relations to the Primal Love as 
near and pleasant, even though the need of human fel- 
lowship binds a’ share of our affections to the earth ? 
Here in the mountains there need be no doubt of at least 
the broadest meanings of nature and the soul above 
nature. The great harp of creation is strung with chords 
of continually increasing fineness, from the rocks and trees 
up to men and the angels. Woods, winds, and waters, 
in all their varied forms of beauty, are God’s concrete 
thoughts ; man’s spiritual excellences are His abstract 
thoughts. To understand nature is to draw near to the 
Great White Throne and worship in humble adoration ; 
but to understand the human soul is to take part in the 
workings of the Divine Intellect ; and feel the solemnity 
of its mightiest aspirations. 

Whoever has watched the rushing storms rise on these 


6 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


mountains and drive the sunshine before them like an 
affrighted thing ; or has lain in summer under the cot- 
ton-woods and listened to such sounds as the poet hears, 
stretched at ease under slow-swaying branches ; or has 
seen the great valley arched by a rainbow like the en- 
trance into heaven ; or has heard the distant song of the 
mocking-bird, whose unknown words may mean any- 
thing that is good and joyful ; or has imagined himself 
into the low music of the river till he sobs and trembles 
with the exquisite sympathy of rhythm — surely such a one 
cannot doubt that he has added greatly to his soul’s wealth. 
And I wonder if the mortal is living who could stand at 
night under the wide sky of Havilah and not feel strength- 
ened and pacified by the visible peace of God’s firma- 
mental dwelling — not know that, somewhere beyond these 
glimpses and vague dreams, there is an existence eternal, 
tranquil, satisfying, of whose perpetuity our impatience 
of all littleness, of all inefficiency, is a sure sign and 
token. It was good of God to place us within sight of 
His peace, even if we can not at once attain to it ; it was 
good of Him to give us hopes of such attainment, even 
when our soul’s tumult fiercely interposes. Surely, the 
mere sight of good things has power to make us better. 

The valley in which the camp of Havilah is situated is 
broad enough for the passage of a dozen such rivers as 
the one that flows through it — so broad that at the farther 
side, even in clear weather, the mountains loom dimly 
through pale haze and melt imperceptibly into the wide 
sky ; but the river, as if resenting a course equidistant 
from heights it is forbidden to touch, makes a sudden 
angry dash against the foothills, and then all at once 
calms its rebellious waves and flows on quietly under the 
beetling cliffs, pacified by its one wrathful paroxysm. 

The steep gulches of these foothills are always in shadow : 
from the river’s bank the blackness in them looks like 


W THE VALLEY OE HA VlLAH. 


7 


cataracts of ink. In summer when the sunshine is yel- 
lowest and the shadows are blackest, the traveller glances 
up with scared, distrustful eyes, half-believing that such 
opaqueness is more than shadow — that it is something 
substantial whose weight may dislodge it from the air- 
hung ledges where it clings, and plunge it down into the 
valley like a landslide. 

The valley is not only broad but long ; and in winter 
it is very desolate. Winter in Havilah means the rainy 
season of December and January. The long heats of 
summer have dried up everything before the rain comes, 
and the valley looks like a bare, boundless plain with the 
mountains for white-edged clouds on the horizon. The 
rainy season makes it doubly desolate ; then there is 
only the gray valley narrowed by the mists, a gray river in 
the midst of it, and, on clearer days, gray mountains on all 
sides, like a deepen blurred shading of the sky. Out- 
side of the camp there is no sign of effort anywhere — the 
road is not an effort but an accident ; and there is no 
sound but the roar of the river, the throbbing of the winds 
in the pines, or the occasional howling of a coyote from 
the hill. On rare days the storm ceases for a little and 
the gray sky thins to a vacant dimness, almost as if the 
sun were about to shine through ; but in reality that pale 
gray is heavy with rain. Even while you look the clouds 
fall from heaven with a plummet-like rush and the air 
heaves with the liquid melody of the storm. Gazing out 
through the blue-green air is like standing at the bottom 
of the sea and trying to look away through the endless 
waters. During the rainy season there is rain always in 
sight. Even when by chance the zenith is clear and 
blue, the scolloped rim of the horizon is dim with clouds 
that rise with compact edges which are soon torn into 
strips and shreds by sudden winds. Yet with all this 
moisture nothing grows ; nothing suggests the approach of 


8 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


spring; and when settled weather comes at last, the desola- 
tion is so complete as to remind one of the earth before any 
rain fell and before there was a man to till the ground. 

That is Havilah at its worst, in the brief winter. When 
the storms are over, the world rests in a stupor like the 
languor of convalescence, and Nature seems holding her 
breath in awe of the miracle of returning life within her. 
But, in spite of the grayness of the valley and the foothills, 
one feels the sweet, secret growths of spring going on in 
hint and suggestion ; in the rich quiet of things there are 
prophetic subtleties of song as unmistakable as in the si- 
lence of a young bird that has not yet uttered a note. Then 
the spring comes on with a rush. It is easy to imagine 
that you hear the grass grow, that you feel the tingling 
ecstasy of buds stretching up from beneath the moist 
ground. Almost in a day the valley is green with grass 
and bright with flowers ; the iris stands adrip with sun- 
shine^ thesweetbriar breaks into red stars, the wind shakes 
out honey from the clover blossoms. In everything there 
is an ecstasy of satisfaction with the “little span of life ” 
even the glooms under the cottonwoods by the river, 
persistent as they are all day, are content to last only 
as long as the sun shines and then sink away into the 
shapeless void of night. Ah ! the beautiful world ! There 
can be no question of betterment anywhere : leaf-hid flower 
and thorn alike are perfect ; day and night alike are good. 
The souls of men become optimistic, religious ; people 
are willing to substitute the doctrine of transubstantiatioi 
for more practical, rational beliefs ; they say, let the far- 
off world wag as it will, our pleasure is here, where God is 
so near and friendly. 

The country was named after that Havilah of Scripture 
which was rich in gold, bdellium and onyx-stone ; and 
there was a time, not long ago, even as men remember, 
when people flocked hither from the uttermost parts of 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


9 

the earth in search of the hidden treasures of the rocks. 
An occasional fortune is made by the solitary miner even 
now, but that is rare. Havilah has gone down — “ petered- 
out, ” the Californians say of it. If the prospector is able 
to supply himself with coffee, beans, and whiskey, he con- 
siders that he is doing very well in these days. 

But the “ boom ” of Havilah’s prosperous years left its 
mark on the region. Traces of the extinct population are 
common — not such traces as are found among the ruins 
of Oriental cities, no vases, no statuary, no temples. 
Nothing artistic : shreds of pottery, indeed, but of the vul- 
gar-useful sort which excludes the possibility of a Greek 
influence ; tumble-down cabins, charred sticks, the remains 
of solitary camp-fires in rocky recesses. 

Sometimes these archaic fragments are more than sug- 
gestive, they are ghastly. It is likely that even the unscien- 
tific foot-passenger among the mountains will one day find 
out — and he will prefer to forget the discovery — that there 
are zoological resemblances between thejaw-bones of men 
and mules. The gulches are full of dead, people — people 
who were once buried but have come to the surface again, 
and recommenced their restless journeyings to and fro on 
the face of the earth. The wolves and the storms have 
attended to it. They are famous democrats. 

We know little or nothing of these dead men individ- 
ually — the names of such exiles are as useless to modern 
civilization as would be a list of all the children of Israel 
in Egypt — but we may infer that collectively they were 
devoutly religious, according to their light ; else why 
came they so far to offer up their lives here in the service of 
their god ? With them there was no hesitation, no choice. 
The range of their ideas included riches and death, 
no more. Failing to get wealth, they died for it as for 
a great cause. We who use up our lives in pleasure 
as we do a cigar, hesitating even at the last to throw 


10 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


away the useless stub lest there be a whiff or two left in it 
that we may enjoy, have no conception of their irrespon- 
sibility in the matter of life and death. It was sublime to 
see how they took possession of themselves, leaped mo- 
mentarily into a conflagration of self-assertion, then passed, 
a red flame vanishing in smoke. Sublime, but terrible — a 
moral scourge whose effect still lingers. They knew no 
future, no past. They had the present, and filled that with 
the terror of their wills. The idea of immortality eluded 
them ; they said, We are not a set of tops that go on spin- 
ning forever. What they were, they knew not, cared not. 
It was enough to feel themselves masters of the hour, to 
ride dizzily on the highest crest of the wave. It was not 
a code of life — it was a philosophy of defeat. And there 
are men who have completed their threescore and ten, 
with a reputation for wisdom, who are forced to be con- 
tent with neither more nor less. 

Fools they were, traitors to the high ideals of their race. 
They gained nothing by their fanatic devotion to their 
god, reached no ultimate conclusions, had no reconciling 
assurance of better things, discovered no rule by which it 
seemed good to live and die. Their ferocious enjoyment 
of the present was a troublous experience at best — the 
uncertain poise of a desperate gamester for a moment on 
the summit of circumstance. They discovered nothing, 
I fancy, that could help you or me through the world. 
They thought little of principles ; they were busy with 
actions. Such knowledge of life as they gained must 
have been of the negative sort which impotent survivors 
substitute reluctantly for action, when action is no longer 
effective. Some of them perished like cattle, falling from 
stupidity to insensibility, without knowing or caring what 
the transition meant ; others cursed God and died, carry- 
ing the defiance of their lives into their deaths. Some 
stood erect for years against winds which would wreck 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


II 


a ship in an hour ; the few whose prayers were granted 
learned perhaps that it is better to sigh for an ideal than 
sorrow over a reality (an ex post facto verity of little com- 
fort), and discovered the grim truth that adopting con- 
ventional opinions of wealth and happiness is like adopt- 
ing other people’s children, entailing consequences of 
care with only doubtful intervals of satisfaction. No mat- 
ter ; whatever they learned, they are wise in their silence, 
giving us to learn the lesson for ourselves in our own 
good time and way ; and if the knowledge we are ca- 
pable of is after all only vanity, we may be glad at least 
that the acquirement of it breaks the monotony of our 
days with variety and purpose that even a consecration 
of mind and heart to false gods is nobler than brute slug- 
gishness and indifference. And when at last we too shall 
pass silently into silence, we may be sure that our wisdom 
will be no less than the wisdom of all who have gone before 
us if we can trust that we go to the fulfilment of all that 
we left incomplete, to an infinite knowledge unshadowed 
by doubt, an eternal good unconditioned by evil ! What 
is there to fear in death, believing it to be the awakening 
where dreams of God come true ? 

But we are not concerned with these dead men of Hav- 
ilah. The dead are always an incident, a digression ; 
our chief interest is still with the living. Havilah has its 
gold-seekers to-day, scattered indeed and degenerate, — if 
we may put confidence in the heroes of local tradition, — 
but still moved by the devout spirit of their predecessors 
and willing to die in the service of the old god. They 
are not nice people, these modern provincial worshippers 
of Mammon. A brief sojourn among them tempts one 
to think them bad altogether. But one has need to take 
care of his conclusions. Practical sociology is an exper- 
imental science, and an experiment on such material may 
be easily misinterpreted. Certainly, they are not nice 


1 2 iN THE VALLE Y OF IIA VILAH, 

people ; among them are gamblers, wife-beaters — hus« 
band-beaters, too — adulterers, murderers, outlaws of every 
degree of turpitude — men and women with wrinkles in 
their lives whose smoothing out must be the work of di- 
vine hands ; but then, too, there is much generous friend- 
ship of a boisterous, roaring kind, an unselfishness in 
material affairs which would be beautiful in finer na- 
tures, and a sense of justice amounting to a pas- 
sion. That is not saying much for them ; to recon- 
struct a man from such data seems as hopeless as to 
rebuild a temple from shattered plinth, and crumbling 
cornice, but the result of such reconstruction is not alto- 
gether without its charm. Regarded philosophically as 
a legitimate object of human inquiry, these people are not 
unworthy of a place in the history of primitive races ; 
considered socially, they point a moral to civilized man, 
indicating as they do his infinite capacity for development 
and retrogression. We can not help judging and con- 
demning, but it would be well to stop and think whether 
we are not judging and condemning ourselves under their 
hard conditions. Are we so certain of our own virtuous 
footing that we can without danger poise ourselves on 
our little ledge and push off those who are on the ledge 
below us ? Nay ; to whatever summit of personal per- 
fection we may climb, the abyss of self is always yawning 
at our feet, ready to engulf us if we stumble and fall. 
Character is the aggregate of life’s accepted good and 
evil, and only at the last moment ot earthly consciousness, 

I think, can we compare our acts with our intents, and 
know how strong we are. 

This book is a history of several of Havilah’s latter-day 
adventures. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


*3 


CHAPTER II. 

Those who understand the signs say that the rainy sea- 
son is over. By that they mean that the weather is in a 
transitional state ; for at times the sun is still banked 
with clouds, his rays are faint in shaded gray circles, he 
is like a thought fading out in a word. Often even when 
the zenith is cloudless the rain still hangs on the high 
horizon in long, slender, isolated showers, like swaying 
scarfs of frayed gray silk, while mountains beyond moun- 
tains, each with a grayer vail of rain, bend forward through 
the mist. And people may look up thither from the val- 
ley and call to mind how God once gathered the waters 
together in one place. 

But to-day the clouds are wiped from the sky like breath 
from a glass. The sunshine falls freely, refreshed by 
recent wind and storm. The mountains seem to draw 
their ice-crowned heads farther away from each other, 
and the snow on them kindles into a blaze that freezes 
and burns. Here and there on the southern slopes of the 
foothills the grass shows itself faintly. To-day the val- 
ley is a flat, desolate expanse of adobe ; to-morrow it will 
be a sea of grass, broken by billows of flowers. That is 
the way spring comes in California. It is as if you were 
to fall asleep with the November rain surging and sob- 
bing around the corners, and awaken in the morning to see 
full-blown roses nodding at you outside the window. 

To Mr. Ephraim Pugsley, who was in a mood to dwell 
on disagreeable details, it appeared that the spring had 
never before manifested itself in a series of such peculiar 
annoyances. He had never before at this season of the 
year seen the sky when it looked so dry, or the earth when 


14 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


it looked so ineffectually damp ; the river struck him as 
insufferably familiar in its garrulous monotone ; and he 
had never known the mountains to insist themselves so 
offensively on his attention — like blundering strangers 
who persist in being friendly. For Mr. Pugsley was not 
without a sensibility to uncongenial surroundings when 
he lacked the material means by which a cheerful mascu- 
line optimism may be sustained without an exhausting 
effort of the will. Toiling along the valley in his decrepit 
emigrant wagon, it was hardly to be expected that he 
should feel cheerful. But there was more than the weather 
and the wagon to complain of. He had a sickly wife 
and two healthy, grown-up daughters on his hands ; and, 
worse than all the rest, not a drop of comfort had passed 
his lips since six o’clock this morning, and it was now 
almost nine. 

The good man was feeling the coercion of circum- 
stances in a lively manner. He was disgusted with life. 
However, that was nothing new. Indeed, it was notice- 
able that Mr. Pugsley was always either disgusted with 
life or madly in love with it, according to the condition 
of his bottle. Just now the very sky was hateful, the 
landscape was insulting in its arrogant immobility. The 
mountains especially stirred him to unreasoning rebel- 
lion. He longed to kick them out of sight beyond the 
horizon ; he hated them more than he could have done 
had they pointed derisive fingers and hooted their scorn 
of him ; he hated everything more than he had ever done 
in all his life before. The two skinny, straining horses 
were repulsive as a picture of conscientious, futile en- 
deavor. Mr. Pugsley was not in a mood to contemplate 
pictures of conscientious endeavor that worked with small 
result to lessen the distance between that point and the 
next tavern. He cursed the poor beasts mentally while 
he lashed them with his great rawhide, thinking all the 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA II. 


• *5 

time that he could manage to put up with that snail’s pace 
if they would only resent his ill-usage with as much as a 
turn of their drooping ears or a twist of their mangy tails. 
It angered him to know that he was expending his ener- 
gies on flesh quite callous to the sting of his whip : he 
might as well cowhide a stone wall for all the relief it 
afforded his feelings. He wanted to make something cry 
out and implore. 

He had entered the valley early in the morning : it 
would be impossible to reach the camp ofHavilah before 
noon — three long hours yet That made in all six hours 
of unmodified thirst between drinks. Good heavens ! 
what was the world coming to ? Why, in the improvident 
moment of comfort succeeding his morning’s glass had 
he decided to keep his remaining six bits to provide a 
slice of bacon for the family on reaching Havilah instead 
of filling his bottle like a Christian and faring sumptuous- 
ly all the way ? At this point his reflections on his own 
strength of mind were by no means flattering. Decidedly, 
he had acted the part of a fool. When a man begins to 
call himself a fool, and to believe what he says, his dis- 
tress is indeed great. A deficiency of nervous fibre in 
the animal organism does not necessarily indicate a dul- 
ness of all sensation and emotion ; it is easy to believe 
that a cubic inch of chalk is the cemetery of unnumbered 
lively joys and sorrows, granting that the animalcules of 
ancient ocean beds were capable of caring for their dinner. 
Probably Mr. Pugsley’s pangs were no less severe because 
he belonged to an undeveloped variety of the human 
species ; on the contrary, the fact may be adduced as an 
argument in favor of the keener poignancy of his griefs, 
for is not development itself a series of pangs accompany- 
ing a protracted yearning for the unattainable ? And are 
not the pangs of growth at least as vivid as those of sub- 
sequent fulfilment ? 


i6 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


Mr. Pugsley turned on his seat and scowled back at 
the occupants of the wagon as if to fill up a gap in his 
anger by contemplating its adjuncts. 

There was Mrs. Pugsley, a hatchet-faced, moist-looking 
woman of past forty, who may be described as looking 
less like herself than the fading consciousness of herself. 
Vapid, featureless, disintegrated, she seemed to be pass- 
ing through a slow process of evaporation in which the 
atmosphere assisted. • She was reclining on a bundle of 
dirty blankets and damp straw, with'an unwashed skillet 
threatening her ear, and one coarse shoe, unlaced and 
flapping wide in betrayal of an undarned stocking, repos- 
ing half way inside a lidless coffee-pot. Her eyes were 
closed, and occasionally she put her hand to her head 
in impatient pain. Behind her was Maud Eliza, the 
youngest of the family, a strapping miss of eighteen, who 
was staring stupidly at the muddy wagon-track and 
plaiting and unplaiting her soiled apron in intervals of 
yawning. Maud Eliza was a sort of incipient fool. She 
was never quite herself unless she was giggling, and at 
her best she had never been known to do more than make a 
desultory remark of less than average intelligence. Maria, 
the elder of the sisters, and the strong-minded one of the 
family, was fast asleep in the back of the wagon, bolt up- 
right and open-mouthed, quite undisturbed by the heav- 
ing and plunging of the unwieldy vehicle. 

Mr. Pugsley was in a humor to expatiate on the hard- 
ships of a man doomed to take care of a family of women. 
Just now his daughters seemed hardly less disagreeable 
in their over-measure of health than did their mother in 
her never-ending fretfulness and complaining. What had 
they been born for, the whole three of them ? What was of 
the use such incapacity — of such sickliness and ineffectual 
health ? Those bouncing girls, with their broad shoulders 
and red cheeks — why had such health been given to them if 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH 


7 


not to be turned somehow to the advantage of the family ? 
And yet those girls had never even earned their salt. 
Now, think of that, said Mr. Pugsley to himself — never 
even earned their salt Were they not as able to work 
for their living as he was ? And, if so, why hadn’t they 
done it ? He asked the question with a flourish of 
mental oratory that surprised himself. Why hadn’t they 
done it ? He gave a slash at the melancholy steeds, and 
then glared back at his female dependents. Why, indeed ? 
They could do it, and, by hokey, they should do it if ever 
them gumgummedold plugs — Mr. Pugsley used a stronger 
adjective — dragged him and his gumgummed family into 
camp at Havilah. They’d find out a thing or two then, 
or he was much mistaken. They’d see then who was 
the head of the family and who was to be obeyed. He 
felt greatly injured, greatly in earnest. His thirstiness 
filled him with an overpowering sense of wrong, and he 
resolved that the future should be revolutionary and re- 
formatory. Those girls should go to work. He had had 
enough of this. 

There was Maria snoring contentedly in her corner — he 
wished with all his heart that she would bite her tongue as 
the wagon made one of its sudden, crazy lunges. It would 
have done him good just to hear her scream ; though, 
come to think of it, he had never heard Maria scream — 
she wasn’t one of that kind. It was more like her to make 
other folks scream than do it herself. She had a temper 
Maria had. He had always hesitated about crossing her 
will — he admitted that he was a trifle afraid of her, even 
in his present mood of wrathful recrimination. There was 
such an unpleasant look in her eye when her temper was 
fired, and she was uncommonly strong in her arms, too, 
as he had good reason to remember. He was obliged to 
confess that there was but little community of feeling be- 
tween his eldest daughter and himself. She had fallen 

z 


8 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


into a state of chronic objection, she disapproved of all his 
habits ; it had been largely through her interference that 
he had kept that six bits in his pocket this very morning, 
instead of having his bottle filled like a man of sense ; and 
here was the consequence of it. Well ! he would pay her 
for that when they got to Havilah. Maria should go to 
work. He nodded his head emphatically as he drama- 
tized himself in the act of making her do what she disliked. 
To be sure, she had always had her own way — she knew 
what she didn’t want and acted accordingly — but did that 
signify that she was always going to keep it up ? Mr. 
Pugsley thought not. This thing had gone faj enough, 
Maria should go to work — if he could make her. 

As for Maud Eliza, the giggler, he had no doubt of his 
ability to manage her. And he would put an end to her 
everlasting tittering, which was always forthcoming as a 
sort of standing exclamation point to Maria’s sarcasms- 
against him who, by virtue of his position as husband and 
father, ought to be revered and cherished by his depen- 
dents, not trodden underfoot and insulted. Mr. Pugsley 
straightened himself after arriving at this conclusion. The 
thought of his ability to make others uncomfortable brought 
a glimpse of comfort into his miserable present — revived 
him like a river that waters a thirsty land. 

He cast a look of inclusive vindictiveness at the uncon- 
scious group behind him, but his eye rested longest and 
most malevolently upon his wife. There was the prime 
cause of all his woes — that woman ; had he never set eyes 
on her, what might he not be by this time ? State senator, 
perhaps, or — delicious possibility ! — proprietor of a gin- 
shop on Dupont Street, in San Francisco. He ground his 
teeth together with rage at the thought. That woman — 
she had been a chain to his neck, an obstacle to his feet 
since the first day he met her. And it was she who ob- 
jected this very morning, seconding Maria in that whin- 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


J 9 


ing voice of hers, when he paid two bits at the last tavern 
for his finger of the oh-be-joyful — had begged him to buy 
her a ham sandwich instead, advancing as an argument 
that otherwise she should immediately take measures to 
die. Ham sandwich, indeed ! Was it a time to talk of 
ham sandwiches when his last dollar was busted in a land 
where budge was two bits a glass ? 

And here she was, with her two infernal healthy brats 
lolling about like a trio of ladies out for an airing, while 
he — they might as well openly mock at his distress as be 
thus indifferent to it. 

He could bear it no longer. His rage strangled him. 
His outraged feelings, confined too long to one channel 
broke forth in violence. He reached over and gave his wife 
a deliberate, vicious poke in the ribs with the butt of his 
whip. (Such modes of expressing masculine ideas with 
their original subjective intensity are not yet obsolete in 
California). 

Mrs. Pusgsley started convulsively, gave a stifled groan 
and opened her eyes. Then, raising herself on one el- 
bow, she stared at him, wide-eyed and helpless, catching 
her breath. She made no attempt at retaliation. She 
seemed to dread a repetition of the brutal thrust. 

“Oh, Ephraim ! ” she gasped, finally, falling back and 
clutching her side. 

“ ‘Oh, Ephraim!’” mimicked her spouse, glaring at 
her with bleared, furious eyes. “Did ye say ‘oh, Eph- 
raim ’ to me V in that air tone o’ voice ? Did ye ? I’ll ‘ oh, 
Ephraim ' ye! ” And he gave the helpless creature an- 
other deliberate poke, boring the whipstock into her side 
with ferocious enjoyment. 

The woman sprang up, aghast and screaming. 

“Oh, Lord A’mighty, ye’ve killed me! ” she cried, in 
a shrill half-shriek, “ ye’ve run the whipstock clean through 
me!” 


20 


IN' THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH i 


“.I’ll larn ye ! ” growled Ephraim, just as he saw Maria 
opening her eyes from her nap. “ I'll larn ye ! ” 

“What’s he been doin’ to ye?” cried the girl, only half 
awake. “ ’ She been layin’ hands on ye ? Shall I thump 
’im ? ” 

Mrs. Pugsley had settled back again among the blankets 
and was clutching her side hysterically. For some time 
she could not speak, but raised herself repeatedly with 
painful exhalations. She recovered, however, sooner than 
was to be expected. Probably it was not the first attack 
of the kind from which she had recovered. 

“ He’ll be the death o’ me yet,” she began presently, in 
a high wailing voice. “I’ve knowed it — I’ve felt it in my 
bones for years, ’n’ now here ’tis. ’N’ I wa'n’t doin’ nothin 
nuther, — ye know I wa’n’t, Ephraim, — not the fust blessed 
thing. Why couldn’t ye lerrfme be ? I didn’t say nothin’ 
’n’ I wa’n’t a-tetchin’ o’ ye, but was behavin’ decent ’n’ 
’spectable, jes’ ’s I was learned to, alius. Oh, Lord, my 
side, my side ! Ye’ve smashed it clean in — I know by 
the feelin’ o’ it t ye’ve smashed it clean in ! ’’ 

“ I’ll larn ye ! ” repeated Ephraim, alarmed at the look 
on Maria’s face, which he perceived, as the saying goes, 
with the tail of his eye. 

“ I don’t see what I’ve done to be used so fer, ” con- 
tinued Mrs. Pugsley, closing her eyes and clutching her 
side, while the tears oozed forth copiously. “ I don’t see 
why I can’t be let ’lone when I’m behavin’ decent ’n’ 
’spectable. What’s the use o’ knowin’ howto behave if a 
body can’t be let ’lone when they’re doin’ it ? I didn’t do 
nothin’ to be poked fer — I don’t never do nothin’, n’ the 
hull kit ’n’ possey 6’ ye know it’s well ’s what I do. I 
was behavin’ myself like a lady, peaceable n’ quiet. 
When I was a Swipes ’ fore I was married I wa’n’t battered 
about like this ’ere. I don’t harm nobody, ’n’ the world’s 
wide ’n’ they’s room ’nough in it ’thout quar’lin. Oh, 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


21 


Lord, my side ! Ye’ve done fer me this time — ye’ve 
bored a hole clean through the ribs o’ me — ye’ve mixed 
my lungs ’n’ liver all together ! ” 

“The devil was alius in ye,” declared Ephraim in weak, 
self-justification. 

“ I knowed suthin’ was goin to happen, though — I had 
a dream las’ night ’n’ I knowed well ’nough, twas a warn- 
in’,” continued the moist woman, assuming the adjuring 
tone of an interpreter of dreams and omens. “I dreamt I 
was dressed up beautiful in a ruffled gown ’n’ hoops ’n’ was 
a stan’in’ on a platform singin’ Sweet Belle Mahone like a 
bird in a tree when the audience commenced yellin’ fer 
me to stop, ’n’ when I didn’t they fired beer-mugs into me 
till my face was all cut ’n’ bleedin’ ’n’ I woke up a-scream- 
in\ ”N’ now here’s what it meant ! ” 

“ What’s he been doin’ to ye ? ” demanded Maria again, 
now fully awake. Her voice held a menace for her father, 
even while it was roughly sympathetic for her mother’s 
pain. 

“ Oh, nothin’, nothin’ ! ” repeated the moist woman, 
drearily. “It don’t matter, nohow. It’s only me. I 
ain’t nobody. Oh, why was I ever borned into this ’ere 
world ? ” 

“That’s what I'd like to know,” put in Ephraim, 
sharply. 

“ Everybody’s forgot ’t I was a Swipes wunst ’n’ lived 
in style,” complained Mrs. Pugsley, her present wretched- 
ness reawakening vibrations of memory. “ I’m a pure, no 
’count criter. Nobody ain’t proud o’ me.” 

“ I want to know wha t he’s been doin’ to ye,” insisted 
Maria, impatiently. 

“ Oh, he didn’t do nothin’ — leastways nothin’ fer ye to 
mind ’bout,” replied Mrs. Pugley in the montonous sing- 
song of superficial resignation. “I don’t want ye to 
quar’l with ’im o’ my ’count. I ain’t nobody to fight over, 


22 IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH 

if I was wunst a Swipes o’ Swipes’s Bar. Oh, dear ! oh 
my side ! Never mind what he’s been a-doin’ to me. I 
don’t want ye quar’lin’ — the world’s wide ’nough to 
keep shet o’ that. Oh, Lord ! ” Here an overpowering 
sense of injury overcame Mrs. Pugsley’s faint desire to 
keep her husband and daughter from a personal encoun- 
ter, and she drifted into renewed reproaches. “’N’ I 
wan’t a-doin’ the fust blessed thing — not the fust blessed 
thing. Oh, I wish ’t I was dead, I do — I do — I don’t care 
where or how. A grave’s the least important thing o’ 
life — I wish’t I was dead ’n’ buried under the wet mud 
where he’d have to lemme be ! ” 

Despairing of finding out the truth from her mother, 
Maria turned, as a last resort, to her father. 

“ What a’ ye been doin’ to ’er?” she demanded. 

“None o’ yer bizness !” snapped the head of the 
family. 

“ I’ll make it some o’ my bizness if ye don’t keep yer 
paws off ma,” threatened Maria. 

“ Oh, ye will, will ye?” sneered the father. 

“ Yes, I will ! ” she cried, fiercely. “ I ain’t a-goin’ to 
set by ’n’ see ’er ’bused by nobody — much less by a ole 
coward like you ! ” 

“ Never mind, never mind,” quavered the moist wo- 
man, drawing her foot out of the coffee-pot and trying to 
look impressive. “ Don’t fight ’n’ quar’l over me — I ain’t 
nobody. It’ll all come back to ’im after I’m dead. Its 
many a pore night’s rest he’ll have then with my sperrit 
a-moanin’ ’n’ a groanin’ round ’ im in the dark. I can’t 
last forever. I’ve been dyin’ these twenty odd year, ’n’ 
it’ll soon be over now ! ” 

Ever since the beginning of the controversy Maud 
Eliza had been sitting in her corner of the wagon in- 
dulging in an uninterrupted sequence of snickers that 
seemed likely to end k in asphyxia or dislocation, but at 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAV1LAH. 


2 3 


the prospect of peace conveyed in her mother s resigned 
tones, she sobered herself by an effort. Peace after war 
was to her something like prose after poetry. She had 
felt the need of excitement for some time, and a family 
broil satisfied a present craving of hers. She seized her 
apron with both hands in keen expectant delight and 
whispered across the wagon to Maria : 

“I jess soon tell what he done if neither o’ them won’t. 
He poked ’er in the ribs with the butt o’ his gad — that’s 
what he done — ’an, made ’er squeak awful, ’n’ he done it 
vicious, ’n’ I seen ’im, too ! ” 


24 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH 


CHAPTER Hi. 

A silence fell upon the contentions of the Pugsleys — a 
moment prophetic of an oncoming rush of moral wind 
and thunder which put all things in a state of uncertain- 
ty and tilled the air with the expectation of violent change. 
One could see Maria’s anger rising — it could almost be 
felt. 

Ephraim, who could hardly have upheld his paternal 
authority even among those Oriental races where to be a 
father is to have a guaranty of filial reverence, felt a 
growing dread of the conflict. Maud Eliza, certain that 
the battle was about to be renewed, caught her breath 
in a sort of ecstasy, then threw her dingy apron over 
her head and relapsed into griping convulsions of unre- 
strained giggles. 

Maria’s eyes flashed like the eyes of an untamed angry 
horse. She turned on her father with clenched hands 
and set teeth. 

“Ye poked ma in the ribs with the butt o’ yer gad ! ” 
she cried. 

Mrs. Pugsley, who had been originally of a poetic turn of 
mind in the days of the Swipeses of Swipes’s Bar, opened 
her eyes at this point and began in a premonitory manner : 

“ Don’t quar’l — don’t quar’l ’n’ git to hatin’ o’ each other,” 
she said, weakly attempting the blessed role of peace- 
maker. “ The world’s wide ’nough to stay in ’thout hatin’ 
o’ each other. Hate is darkness ’n’ love is light,” she 
added, soaring into sentiment. 

But Maria was not in a mood to sentimentalize. She 
was mastered by a great longing to do something vio- 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


25 


lently retributive. At these moments of robust indignation 
she was capable of such lawless deeds as spring from the 
undisputed egotism of Eastern tyrants. The considera- 
tion that the one she proposed to punish was her father 
had no weight against her impulse of pitiless self-asser- 
tion ; the paternal relationship held no sacredness for 
her ; she only realized that the weak had been maltreated 
by the strong, and that it was in her power to make the 
aggressor suffer the full measure of pain he had inflicted. 
She did not pause to calculate the means by which an 
equilibrium of justice for her mother coul’d be restored ; 
she was given up wholly to a blind zeal to assert her 
disapproval in peremptory actions whose consequences 
could hardly pass beyond the jurisdiction of her will. 
The ill, complaining mother had become to her a sort of 
reservoir for the emotions which had been shut off from 
other outward leading channels. Her feeling may have 
been less selfish than that— one phase of that good which 
makes us all akin, -which is deeply hidden, perhaps, like 
tarnished gold in an Etruscan tomb, but eventually comes 
forth bright and shining into the open day. 

Mr. Pugsley inwardly quailed before the girl, but he 
had resolved to make a stand. In his domestic govern- 
ment he had never been conscious of more than a spin- 
dling outgrowth of that corrective faculty which Nature has 
implanted vigorously in most men, so that his children 
had got on with little or no assistance from him and had 
come to regard his occasional intervention as an unwar- 
rantable interference with the operation of their own 
sweet wills ; consequently he felt uncertain of his ground 
at the very beginning of this domestic revolution, and was 
half-inclined to beat a hasty retreat before engaging in 
actual combat with his doughty daughter. But, no ; it 
was well enough for Maria to defend herself when oc- 
casion required, but by what right had she constituted 


2 6 IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 

herself the body-guard of her mother? Wasn’t he the old 
woman’s rightful protector — her husband ? And if he 
saw nothing wrong in the treatment she received at the 
hands of people, whose business was it to complain ? 
Not Maria’s, surely. The fact was, that girl was getting 
too big for her clothes — she must be brought to a true 
knowledge of her relations to superior powers. This thing 
of her running the whole Pugsley institution had gone far 
enough. He would be firm with his daughter. He 
would show her — with the next tavern three hours ahead 
— that he intended to be master in his own family. 

Reinforced by this logic, he turned on his daughter 
with some spirit. 

“Well, what if I did poke the old gal in the ribs? ” he 
demanded. “Ain’t she my prop’ty to poke in the ribs if 
I want to ? ” 

Mr. Pugsley felt considerable confidence in his intel- 
lectual powers when he devoted them to argument. A 
girl with Maria’s exceptional mental character could hard- 
ly fail to see the force of such luminous reasoning. She 
was a reasonable young woman, Maria, was, barring a 
hint of prejudice which always inclined her to take sides 
with her mother ; and just now her temper seemed a little 
riled. These two points might lead her into ill-considered 
judgments, but Mr. Pugsley felt, with a consciousness of 
firmer nerve tension, that his logic was incontrovertible ; 
and if Maria was not in the mood to admit the superi- 
ority of his arguments, why, so much the worse for her. 

“By hokey, she is my prop’ty,” he cried, with the fiery 
haste of conviction, “’n’ I’m goin’ to poke ’er again ! ” 

He raised the whip and pointed the butt of it toward 
the prostrate woman, ready to give her a sudden thrust. 
The frightened creature shrieked and shrank back, whim- 
pering helplessly, and huddling herself together to avoid 
the stroke. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


2 7 


“Don’t — don’t, Ephraim!” she gasped, hysterically, 
flinging up her hands, but not daring to push the whip 
aside lest she feel the force of it sooner. “ It’ll kill me — 
I can’t stan’ it agin — please don’t, good, kind Ephraim ! ” 
Her voice died away in hoarse, gasping appeal. 

Maria flung herself across her mother’s body and shook 
her fist in the old man’s face. It was the fist of a genuine 
frontier’s woman — as strong as a man’s, and as ready to 
caress as to strike. 

“ Let up on that ! ” she cried, in a voice that tightened 
her throat and seemed to choke her. “If ye fetch ’er 
agin I’ll knock ye stiff — I’ll spatter yer whiskey brains 
out into the mud ! ” 

She looked a very devil as she raised herself above him 
with uplifted arms, her cheeks flushed, her dishevelled 
hair streaming, the red fire burning in her eyes. He felt 
her breath touch his face hot and quick, and threw up his 
elbow between her and him, then peered out at her 
threatening arm. 

“I — I ain’t a goin’ to tetch ’er ! ” he cried in a hasty, 
terrified voice. * 1 Put down yer arm — don’t strike — I wa’n't 
a-goin’ to do nothin.’ I ain’t well, Mariar, ’n’ I can’t stan’ 
one o’ yer thumpin’s to-day — I can’t, really, I wa’n’tagoin’ 
to tetch ’er ! ” 

“Oh,” cried the girl with fierce scorn. “Ye wan’t 
a-goin’ to tetch ’er with yer whip already aimed ’n’ yer 
han’s a-itchin’, was ye ? Oh, no ! Put down that air 
whip, now, quicker ’n the Lord ’ll let ye. Ye’re a fine 
specimen, ain’t ye, wigglin’ aroun’ there like a bug under 
a chip ! The world’s a-missin’ a heap ’t it ain’t got more 
like ye, ain’t it now? Bah ! Ye ain’t wuth slappin ’ ! ” 

Mr. Pugsley, though he saw that she probably would 
not strike, edged farther away from her and sat cringing, 
with his head drawn down between his shoulders like a 
frightened tortoise in its shell. He experienced a swift 


28 IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 

and grateful sense of deliverance when at last Maria sefl 
tied back into her place — a feeling which was compen- 
sation enough even for the lingering consciousness that 
he had tottered and fallen flat where he had intended to 
walk stately. As for Maud Eliza, she had retired again 
behind her apron and only emerged after several moments 
when quite limp and exhausted. 

The wagon plunged on in splashy silence. The sun 
grew warmer, the ground steamed. Not a cloud appeared 
in the void of blue, shapeless air. They passed an open- 
ing in the foothills where a milk-white lake lay asleep in 
the sun with the mists like torn curtains fluttering raggedly 
about the near heights. The air was full of the sound of 
the river — such a hymn as the morning stars once sang to- 
gether ; and for a little while a crystal-clear tributary of 
the river .flowed beside the road, with the sunshine beat- 
ing time on its water to the tinkling melody sung beneath. 
All else was hushed : the pines, on the near foothills were 
inaudible : there was no wind. But to the eye the land- 
scape spoke. There was a massive eloquence in the wide- 
reaching gray plain and the desolate foothills — a language 
of stupendous stoicism and eternal calm. The Pugsleys 
saw nothing, thought nothing of these externals. They 
were occupied wdth the trivial passions \)f their lives, filled 
with the petty spites and inconsistencies of egotism, look- 
ing forward, backward, sidewise, with an aimlessness 
which saw in Nature but a pallid reflection of their needs. 

Mr. Pugsley regarded the laboring horses attentively 
for some time. His bleared eyes held an expression of 
profound meditation, of metaphysical inquiry. He had a 
coward’s respect for the conqueror, and was always anx- 
ious to be reconciled to one who was stronger than he. 
Finally he turned in his seat and looked back at his daugh- 
ter with grim approval. 

“I’ve said it afore, ’n’ I mean it, ’t ye’re the Devil’s 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


2 9 

Own, Mariar,” he declared in a voice which betrayed in- 
voluntary admiration. It was his way of acknowledging 
his daughters supremacy. 

Maria accepted the compliment as a soldier receives 
his pay — as the just due of valor and ability. She only 
blinked slightly. Her father had complimented her in 
like manner under like circumstances many times before, 
and she had grown quite accustomed to her title of the 
Devil’s Own, and was even proud of it. 

“ Ye’ve got yer father’s own grit,” proceeded Ephraim, 
decidedly, but still with something of the timidity in- 
spired by an overawing presence. “ N’ ye ain’t no call 
to be’ shamed o’ that. It ain’t every gal ’ t ’s got a father 
like your’n to take after. Moreover — ” 

“ It ain’t every gal ’t ’s got a father ’t she has to take 
after to keep him from thumpin’ ’er mother,” suggested 
Maria. 

Mr. Pugsley waived the insinuation. 

“Ye must admit, Mariar, it’s very tryin’ to a man to 
have to put up with some things sometimes,” he said, 
“ They ain’t no use talkin’ ’n’ tryin’ to smooth it over, a 
family can be a gummed nuisance wunst in a while.” 
Mr. Pugsley’s courage was increasing with the sound of his 
voice, but he thought best to pronounce his didacticisms 
in general terms, as the least offensive method of produc- 
ing an offensive impression. 

“Ye seem well ’nough contented with yer fam’ly when 
yer bottle’s full,” remarked Maria. 

Mr. Pugsley waived this insinuation also. 

“ The great fault with ye is, Maria,” he said in a 
mildly admonitory tone, “ ’ t ye don’t seem to know when 
a man’s playful ’n’ when he’s in earnest. Ye don’t seem 
to see which is which. Now, ye orter cultervate that air 
faculty ; no woman’s ’magination ’s complete ’thout it. 
It’s what ye need ’n’ I’ll help ye do it, off ’n’ on, ’s I git 


30 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


time. I was only foolin’. I jus’ wanted to rouse the ole 
gal up ’n’ make ’er feel lively. That’s all. ” 

Maria sniffed contemptuously. 

“ We won’t have no more sech rousin’ ’n’ foolin’,” she 
said, with decision. “ It ain’t becomin’ to a man o’ yer 
age ’n’ style o’ beauty.” 

At this choice bit of repartee Maud Eliza giggled till she 
strangled, and finally sobered up in a condition of utter 
diaphragmatic collapse. On the whole, the Pugsleys had 
enjoyed their little quarrel as an agreeable diversion. 
Ephraim experienced a sense of relief, as if a stop-cock 
had been thrown open in the reservoir of his wrath, 
leaving little of the original element behind, and that 
below the present level of escape. Mrs. Pugsley regard- 
ed herself as a martyr visited with peculiar afflictions and 
endowed with extraordinary powers of meeting them 
heroically ; while Maria was glad of another opportunity 
of demonstrating her ability to protect her mother. 

The Pugsleys are humanity in its rudimentary state. 
In them, as in every mother’s son of us, are those- germs 
of saints and devils which Nature has implanted in every 
soul, and whose growth and development blind circum- 
stance determines. 


fiV THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


31 


CHAPTER IV. 

The novelist who is bold enough to write of such people 
as these should make up his mind beforehand to stand 
constantly in an apologetic attitude between them and 
the polite reader, offering iterated excuses for their exist- 
ence, and covering up as best he may their frequent lapses 
of decency and grammar ; for the ethics of art have long 
taught that, if vulgar people must be painted, they must 
be painted picturesquely, inoffensively — in a word, not 
as they are, with blotched complexions and clothing torn 
in unmentionable places, but with an ideal barbarity of 
exterior which pleases and never repels. Leaving out the 
artistic part of the question, let me say, in extenuation of 
certain prominent moral delinquencies discoverable in the 
characters in this book, that probably the best of us have 
felt at times that this world is a bad place to be good in. 
Necessarily it is a particularly bad place for the Pugsleys, 
to whom the stimulus of lofty example has always been 
lacking, and whose ideas of goodness are of an almost 
ethereal vagueness. In a fit of spleen Fate has debarred 
them from those social conditions which adjust men’s bar- 
barous intellectual tendencies into harmony with gentle- 
ness and sympathy. The saving grace of urbanity is a 
mystery to them — they lack a perception of relations. 
Life is at best a great green woodland, in which sweet 
medicinal herbs grow side by side with fetid poisonous 
plants, and through which all the winds of heaven sing or 
thunder ; and if men pluck only nightshade, and hear 
none but the loud, roaring winds, the fault lies not in 


32 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VI LA il 


Nature herself, but in a perverted exercise of sensibilities 
bestowed for a keener, nicer discrimination of things. 
And this perversion is a misfortune, hardly a crime. 

I can but think that humanity is its own excuse for 
being ; a skilled hand has painted us in light and shadow 
— a hand whose work is “good/' transcending criticism ; 
and the shadows no less than the light are needed to make 
up the picture. We may at least learn the sweet lesson of 
pity by studying the lowly uses to which humanity lends 
itself. And we may utilize men as outer consciences : 
for the hatefulness of a vicious life in another may become 
a dominant reason for rightly living our own. It is but 
fair to remember that absolute purity lies only in infinite 
knowledge ; glimpses of this purity, of this knowledge, 
broaden and become more frequent as time goes on ; 
they are the light by which men lay noble deeds for the 
upbuilding of the world’s rising structure of good — the 
converting light which shines even where black ignorance 
and crime seem to make such psychical architecture im- 
possible. The Pugsleys of this world are never without 
certain elements of magnanimity and generous human 
feeling ; there is hope for them individually as for man- 
kind collectively, whose beginning was a handful of dust 
and a divine inspiration. If in the illest-shaped human 
figure there is a beauty and grace of God’s own making, 
of what infinite capability must be the human soul, whose 
garment and obstruction the body is ? 

But the Pugsleys are not introspective — they are boister- 
ously contented with themselves ; and the future to them 
looks promising enough if it appears no worse than the 
present. Bobbing and reeling ubiquitously in unison 
with their incalculable wagon, the interesting family 
labored onward. The air grew hotter ; the mud became 
like tar as the sun rose higher. Yet the heat was all in 
the valley, for on some of the higher levels there had 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


33 

been a slight snowfall the night before, and it had not 
yet melted from the sage-brush and manzanita bushes 
that dappled the foothills like flocks of sheep. Here were 
gray chasms, scarred by the blows of a thousand tor- 
rents ; there a red and yellow mesa lay straight and 
shining as a brazen ruler against the sunny heights be- 
yond it. Anon a foaming torrent plunged over its ver- 
tical precipice, half hid in spray, flung heavenward like 
the arms of despairing, suicidal women. But the travel- 
lers saw nothing of sky or mountain, of tree or water- 
fall. They had become scenery-hardened long ago, and 
had learned to tolerate nature with grim, passive endur- 
ance as an unavoidable adjunct of their material life. 
The agonies of slow travel have often been described at, 
but never touched in, their actuality. The indifference 
to everything but personal discomfort which gradually 
settles down upon the sprightliest spirit becomes in time 
tragic ; and a stage of misery has been reached by civil- 
ized beings even in this age of smooth surfaces, when 
the all-sufficiency of well-curled bangs, — hitherto an un- 
questioned article of religious belief — becomes a subject 
of painful doubt in the feminine mind. 

Mr. Pugsley reflected on the quarrel just ended. De- 
cidedly he was feeling less malevolent than before. To 
be sure, he had been worsted, and Maria had come out on 
top ; but that was a matter of course. Maria had been 
coming out on top ever since he could remember, and he 
would have been surprised and disgusted at any other 
result. The main point gained was that Mrs. Pugley had 
been made to understand her helplessness and depend- 
ence. It had been shown to his satisfaction that she was 
unconditionally his personal property ; that if he chose 
to poke her with a stick, he would do it ; and she might 
infer, as an incentive to good conduct in future, that, if 
fie chose to pitch her out of the wagon, he would do that 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


34 

also — providing that Maria was nowhere in the neighbor 
hood to interfere. Mr. Pugsley’s unconditional right to 
treat his wife as he chose was thus modified by very 
express conditions, which he dared by no means ignore ; 
but the fact remained that she was there, to be made 
miserable whenever his own misery became unbearable 
in its loneliness and required company. 

His surviving irritation led him into broad generaliza- 
tions. 

“ Wimmin is all sprouts o’ the devil/' he remarked, 
flinging the words over his shoulder into the wagon, and 
wishing that they were pebbles that could wound and 
bruise. 

But he received no answer. Maud Eliza did not even 
titter, and Mrs. Pugsley did not even groan. 

“ The man 't gits married ’s warmin' hot water fer his- 
self," he continued more assertively. He paused long 
enough to give each of the horses a cut with his whip, 
and then, receiving no answer, went on : 

“ What a man wants to git married fer 's more 'n I can 
see. They ain’t no comfort in it — they ain’t no sense in 
it ; but everybody does it, jes’ like they had to. Seems 
like marriage follers single blessedness the way death fol- 
lers life — it’s a piece o’ nater ’n’ nat’ral misforshun. Eh ! 
it’s hard swimmin’ with a mill-stun round the neck, ’n’ 
hard livin’ with a passel o’ wimmin draggin’ a man down, 
down — clean down to the very bottom o’ the bottomless. 
No wonder I git tired o’ it ; didn’t the Lord Hisself wunst 
git weary ’n’ want rest ? Leeches ’n’ blood-suckers ain’t 
nothin’ ’longside o’ wimmin ; buzzards ’n’ coyotes ain’t a 
patchin’ to ’em. If they’s anything ’t ’ll rob a man o’ tal- 
ent o’ his nat’ral gifts, ’n’ turn his genyus into fat fer their 
gummed bones, it’s — ” here Mr. Pugsley sawed the air in 
the enthusiasm of his figure — “it’s — by hokey ! — its 
wimmin ! ” 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


35 

Still no answer. Mr. Pugsley looked over his shoulder 
to discover the cause of this unusual silence. Maud Eliza 
was staring stupidly at the wagon-track behind her and 
thrumming with the fingers of one hand against the back 
of the other. Mrs. Pugsley lay quite still, with closed 
eyes, looking very pale and creased and damp. Maria 
was drawing her hair through her fingers in default of a 
comb, preparatory to doing it up. The singular dispo- 
sition of the women to keep quiet encouraged Mr. Pugsley 
to enlarge upon his grievances. He was a man of ex- 
tremes, always supremely blessed or supremely miser- 
able, never even crudely philosophical, as are many of 
his class. To him it was a comfort to din his troubles 
into other ears, no matter whether he was listened to im- 
patiently or not at all. He had no understanding of the 
exegesis of causes — no conception of the truth that an 
exposition of the wrongs dealt to the individual is a 
statement, clear as in figures, of the wrongs dealt by the 
individual. 

“Fat?” cried he, turning again to the horses, but 
speaking loud enough for the women to hear. “Fat, did 
I say ? Fat, ’nough fer a hull pen o’ pigs, which ’ud pay 
fer their keep, as is more hi wimmin does. How in the 
name o’ Hanner they manage to keep so fat, I can’t 
see — 

“Nor I, nuther,” interrupted Maria, grimly. “Spe- 
cially ma.” And then Maud Eliza tittered fit to kill herself 
and recovered with a series of liquid gurgles like the 
sound of water poured from a small -mouthed bottle. 

“What I want,” continued Mr. Pugsley, with the air of 
one who has studied a subject impartially from different 
points of view, “is wimmin folks ’t’s got common-sense. 
This ’ere thing o’ havin’ a pack o’ fools forever follern’ 
after ye, grows mighty wearn’. What I want — ” 

“ Bah ! we hear ducks ! ” cried Maria in derision. 


IN THE VALLEY OF II A VI L AH. 


36 

“ What I want — ” recommenced Ephraim in a louder 
voice, twisting his head and pointing his words with a 
didactic finger. But Maria interrupted him again. 

“ What ye want’s a watch-pocket under yer eye ! ” She 
cried. And Maud Eliza threw herself back and snorted. 

“ Well, don’t quar'l ” said Mrs. Pugsley, formally, from 
her blankets. “ The world's wide ’nough ’thout that. 
’N’ I’ve said it to ye many a time afore.” 

“Oh, we ain’t quar’lin’, ma. I’m jes’ ’predatin' dad’s 
conversation. It’s so interestin’.” 

“ I’d rather have the perrymids o’ Egypt into the wagin 
’n’ three sech great hulkin’ chunks o’ flesh,” proceeded 
Mr. Pugsley, regarding Maria’s irony as a recognition of 
his right to a larger freedom of speech. “ No wonder 
we don’t git ahead — no wonder the hosses is givin’ out, ’n’ 
I’m so thin ye could see daylight through me if the sun 
was in the right place.” 

“Nobody’s denyin’ ye’re oncommon thin,” put in Maria, 
and Maud Eliza snorted again, as in duty bound. 

“What the Bible means by encouragin’ o’ matrimony’s 
more ’n’ I can see,” cried the father, warming up to the 
subject. “ Git up, there, Bonypart, if ye want to keep yer 
skin hull.” 

And he showered on his dejected steeds the blows 
which he felt belonged by right to the exasperating women 
of his own family. 

The black adobe valley stretched out on all sides as 
waste and barren as the primordial firmament of heaven. 
If there had only been a bit of grass somewhere in sight 
on that great level, Mr. Pugsley would not have felt so 
aggrieved, though he had no practical use for grass at 
present and certainly experienced no ecstatic emotion at 
the sight of vernal, growing things. There was a little 
grass on the southern slopes of the foothills, but Mr. Pugs- 
ley did not want it there ; he wanted it where it had not 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


37 

chosen to grow. He wanted everything as it had not chosen 
to be. He wished that power had been given him to 
order the grass and other things about ; there would soon 
be an improvement in the workings of this worldly ma- 
chine. Taverns ad infinitum would approach at the word 
of command and follow that battered emigrant wagon 
in blissful, orderly obedience ; and what a paradise that 
would make of this hideous, black, sticky valley ! 

Our stomachs are the source of most our prayers. 
“ Lord, send us quickly to the next tavern ! ” prayed Mr. 
Pugsley under his breath. 

A sudden jolt of the wagon brought a prolonged groan 
from Mrs. Pugsley. 

Ephraim chuckled hoarsely. 

“ It’s good fer ye, old gal ; ” he chuckled in malicious 
enjoyment. “It’ll stir ye up hi’ make ye healthy. Ye 
loll aroun’ too much. That’s the matter o’ ye — ye loll 
aroun’ too much ! ” 

“Oh, Ephraim!” articulated Mrs. Pugsley in weak 
protest. 

Ephraim expectorated grimly on the horses’ flanks. A 
wife may be a comfort to her husband when she is a dis- 
comfort to herself. 

“ Ye was alius hard on me,” said the moist woman, 
feeling herself an object of reprobation. “Ye never was 
proud o’ me^nobody ever was sens I was a Swipes. ’N’ 
I never do nothin’ — never. There’s room ’nough in the 
world fer all, ” she added, irrelevantly. 

“If ye’d been made to work fer yer livin’ from the very 
first start ’stid o’ settin’ up fer a fine lady in pore health 
’n’ doin’ nothin’ but spreadin’ yerself out on the flat o’ yer 
back from mornin’ till night, ye wouldn’t a-got in sech a 
helpless state. Ye’d a flaxed aroun’ ’n’ kep’ healthy — 
that’s what’s kep’ me a-goin’ all these years.” 

“ Dear, dear,” cut in Maria, ironically. “ Did any one 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


38 

ever see sech a sweet, purty man ? Did any one ever see 
anything slicker ’n’ a peeled onion afore ? ” 

Mr. Pugsley disregarded the sarcasm. His conscious 
inability to cope with his daughter kept his fault-finding 
confined to his wife. 

“ I’ve been too good to ye,” he declared. “ I’ve been 
too good to the hull kit ’n’ possy o’ ye. I've harbored ye 
’n’ clothed ye ’n’ fed ye. I’ve had ye follerin’ aroun’ after 
me — ” 

“Oh, the dear critter!” interrupted Maria with a burst 
of unnatural affection. “ Ma, ma, d’ye reckon it ’ud lem- 
me kiss it ? ” 

“ Mebbe’t would if ye’d coax it,” suggested Maud Eliza, 
from the intricacies of one of her giggling fits. 

“Oh, jes’ wunst, pa ! ” cried Maria, clasping her hands 
in dramatic pleading, “jes’, jes’ wunst, ’n’ then — lemme 
die ! ” 

“Shet up !” cried Ephraim, sternly. “ Ain’t a man got 
a right to finish what he starts to say in his own fam’ly ? ” 

“Let yer dad speak, gals,” put in Mrs. Pugsley, oracu- 
larly, from her blankets. “Go on, Ephraim dear, we’re 
listenin. ” 

“Maud Eliza,” cried Maria, in a severe tone, “ I’m 
’ shamed o’ ye — ye call the blush o’ shame all over my 
face ’n’ halfway down my back. Stop that air gigglin’ 
this instant ’n’ cross yer hands ’n listen’ respectful to yer 
lovin’ father.” 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VlL AH. 


39 


CHAPTER V. 

A man’s faults in the eyes of his family are likely to be- 
come enlarged like nervous tissue under the microscope, 
their increased size making them unrecognizable as a part 
of the marital organism. To-day Mr. Pugsley was more 
than ever sure that Maria exaggerated his shortcomings — a 
freak of judgment altogether wrong in a girl having faults 
of her own which he might exaggerate, too, if he were 
unfair enough to take an uncharitable advantage. Con- 
sidering everything, he could fairly congratulate himself 
on being a very good husband and £ither. He had always 
provided for his family. There was still, a dish of cold 
beans wrapped up in a gunnysack in a corner of the 
wagon, and, if he remembered correctly — and he was 
not likely to forget such particulars — there was a small 
wedge of johnny-cake left over from breakfast. A man 
who provides for his family like that in hard times may 
reasonably be considered a good fellow. He wondered, 
somewhat anxiously whether that greedy Maud Eliza had 
gobbled the johnny-cake in one of the intervals of her gig- 
gling. It would be just like her — it was in her part of the 
wagon. And, if she had, the whole outfit of them might 
go hungry and be hanged, for he proposed to enter into 
negotiations with the bar-keeper at Havilah at about noon 
to-day, and six bits was little enough for the purpose. 

In the midst of these meditations Mrs. Pugsley raised 
herself on one elbow and gazed about her with the blank- 
ness of inanition. She looked very moist and slippery 
among her blankets — like the neglected daughter of an 
ancient river, fated to grow old but never die. 


40 


IN THE VALLEY OF II A VI L AH. 


“It’s rainin’ up there on the foot hills,” she said, in a 
helpless, purposeless way, “’N’they wa’n’t a cloud no- 
here a little while ago. I thought it was goin’ to clear off 
’n’ gimme a chance to enjoy life again. But that’s jes’ the 
way ; even the weather’s agin’ me ’n’ has a spite at me. 

It must a-snowed up there las’ night, too, ’n’ the rocks 
is all damp, ’n’ the sky is damp ’n’ everything’s damp, 
’n’ I’ve got a pain in my lef’ side that’s twistin the life out 
o’ me.” 

Her enumeration of all the wet places in the landscape 
was about as interesting to Ephraim as a scientific classi- 
fication of animals would have been. He gave his horses 
an extra cut with his whip and kept silent. 

“ I hope the rain won’t come down ’ere,” went on Mrs. 
Pugslsy, with the look of one who has been identified with 
humidity for a term of years and would now like a change. 
“I’m glad o’ the sunshine. It feels good, failin' onto 
me ’n’ soakin’ into my bones. I wish’t the wagon didn’t 
have no top, so ’t I could git more o’ the sun.” 

Maria laughed, showing her firm white teeth. 

“ I don’t see’s takin'the waggin-top ’ud make much dif- 
’rence, ” she said. ‘ ‘ The sun seems to get through it ’thout 
much trouble.” 

Mrs. Pugsley pushed back her straggling locks and 
waved a sticky hand in deprecation. 

“That’s jes’ the way with ye, Mariar,” she sighed with 
the dreary monotony of purposelessness. “That’s jes’ 
the way ye alius was. Ye ain’t got no feelin’ — ye’d ’s lief 
set in shadder’s sunshine. Ye’re all Pugsley in that — not a 
grain o’ Swipes. The Swipeses was all fond o’ the sun — 
they had southern blood into 'em. Why, Dad Swipes 'ud 
set aroun’ the door o’ the saloon from mornin’ till night 
doin’ nothin' but enjoyin' his pipe in the sunshine. Oh, 
Lord, the side o’ me ’ll bust off yit, I know ’t will ! ” 

“I wish ’t I had some o’ that Liver Exterminator 't I 


In the Valley of havilaH. 


4i 


seen advertised in big red letters,” said Maria with solici- 
tude. “ I know it ud do ye good. It said it ud cure any- 
thing. ” 

Mrs. Pugsley settled back among her blankets like one 
who watches his own grave dug and is determined not to 
mind. 

“ No — no,” she said, in the deposed empress tone which 
she assumed at h times, twisting her clammy fingers to- 
gether and rolling her head from side to side. “They 
couldn’t cure everything — they’s things as wa'n’t made to 
be cured, ’n’ I’m one o’ ’em. Death’s been campin' on 
my trail for years, V now here ’ tis. ’Tain’t no use bein’ 
a Swipes ; ’t ain’t no use runnin’ away : the faster I run 
the sooner I’ll tumble into the hole ’t ’s been dug fer me. 
No — no. They ain’t nojcure fer the likes o’ me in this ’ere 
world. What’s the use o’ a kittle when it’s all cracked ’n' 
busted every which way? Not ’t I’d compare a Swipes to 
a cracked kittle,” she added with a sudden assumption 
of transitory dignity. “ It’s only the crackin, — the pain. 
Now ye see what ’tis to be well brought up ’n’ have to come 
down. Mariar — Mariar,” she wailed, abruptly relinquish- 
ing her dignity and becoming low-spirited again. “ I’m a 
pore critter as the world treads on. Nobody keers fer 
me ! ” 

“Oh, come, come, ma,” said Maria, cheerfully. “Don’t 
go to takin’ on, don’t go to gittin’ down in the mouth ’n’ 
feelin’ blue. Things ’ll come out all right by’m’by.” 

“ Fer you, yes ; fer me, no,” quavered Mrs. Pugsley in 
antithesis and tears. I wish’t the green grass was growin 
over me, I do — I do ! ” 

“ So d’ I ! ” put in Ephraim, as devoutly as if responding 
in the litany. 

Mrs. Pugsley wept in ostentatious silence for several 
moments, her tears falling upon her general moistness with 
an effect similar to a spring shower on the sea. 


42 


IN THE VALLE Y OF HA VILAH. 


“What’s the use o’ livin’ when dyin’ ’s easier? ” she be» 
gan presently, conscious of what seemed to her the dawn- 
ing of a new idea. “’Tain’t nothin’ to die — it’s livin’ ’t 
uses a critter up. I wish I was dead ’n’ gone ’n’ nothin’ 
left o’ me but my bones a-rottin’ in the dark. I could 
have some comfort then, the dead don’t know their own 
fergittin’.” 

“ Oh, no danger o’ fergittin’j'ow,” broke in Ephraim with 
intense feeling. 

“La, ma, they’s lots V lots o’ things to live fer yit. 
Jes’ think, now ! S’posin’ dad was to up ’n’ strike a gold 
mine — wouldn’t ye be glad ye wasn’t dead, then ? ’N ’ they 
do it here in Havilah wunst in a while, even now, Eve 
heard say. ’N’ then — la, what wouldn’t we do ? Wouldn’t 
we paint the earth red ? ’N ’ here ye’re talkin’ ’s if dyin’ 
was the glory o’ livin’. Oh, ma ! ” 

Ephraim turned impatiently. 

“When I strike a gold mine,” he declared, “the first 
thing Ell see to ’ll be a divorce, ye can bet yer pile on 
that. I wish’t the devil wanted ye ’n’ ’ud take ye, the hull 
passel o’ ye ! ” he added, firing the words over his shoul- 
der as if they were bomb-shells. 

“Looks, like he’s got us a’ready,” remarked Maria in 
her serenest voice. “ Ye’re the head o’ the fam’ly, ain’t 
ye?” 

“ Oh, Mariar, Mariar ! ” cried Maud Eliza with a snort - 
and a strangle. “ What a critter ye be — what a critter ye 
be ! Ye’re a caution to snakes — ye’re enough to kill 
corns ! ” 

Here Mrs. Pugsley dried her eyes with a showy exertion 
of her will, and turning to her husband asked in the voice 
of a confirmed invalid who wishes to appear particularly 
patient : 

“ Ain’t we ’most there, Ephraim, dear?” 

“ ’Most where ? ” growled Mr. Pugsley. 

i 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH 


43 


“ 'Most there — where we’re goin’ — I fergit the name o’ 
the place. Ye know my mem’ry was alius pore. All the 
Swipeses had pore mem’ries, fust ’n’ last.” 

“ I hope ye’re most where ye’re goin’ after ye’re dead !” 
snarled Ephraim. 

“ There, now— let up on that, you! ” cried Maria, warn- 
ingly. And Ephraim fell to examining the mountains. 

“ It don’t matter what he says,” quavered the moist wo- 
man, determined to be resigned. “ It’s all been said fif- 
ty times afore ’n’ I’m used to it. It don’t matter — it’s on- 
ly me. Let *im go on — he won’t have me long to buse ’n’ 
knock aroun.’ Oh, Lord,” she groaned, with sudden appeal 
to interrogation, “why was I horned to be knocked ’n’ 
battered aroun* in this ’ere ridic’lous way ? Why ain’t I 
dead ’n’ gone like the rest o’ the decent folks ? This ’ere 
wide world ain't no place for the likes o’ me.” 

“There, there, ma,” said Maria, as if soothing a fretful 
child. 

The occupants of the wagon were silent for some mo- 
ments having exhausted their ordinary resources of con- 
versation. The light on the foothills grew and filled its 
little spot of sky with soft gray shadows ; a distant moun- 
tain backed one nearer and similar in shape, looking like 
the penumbra of the latter through the mist ; elsewhere 
the sunshine fell deep and peaceful. The wind had risen, 
and they could occasionally catch the music of the pines ; 
now and again they were near enough to the foothills to 
feel the chill fall of shadows from rock and peak ; near 
enough to the river, too, to hear its muffled sound — a 
sibilant murmur through wide spaces of air, like the dis- 
tant beating of many wings. 

“I hope there’ll be plenty o’ men there, to Havilah — 
young men, I mean,” remarked Maud Eliza with con- 
siderable seriousness. ‘ ‘ O’ course there’ll be plenty o* old 
’uns. Seems to me like we ain’t never been nowheres 't 


44 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH 


the men wa’n’t all a-gittn’ purty well on in years V kind 
o’ ruinous . n 

•‘I’ve alius found ’nough o’ both kinds,” said Maria. 
“ I never noticed no signs o’ the breed dyin’ out.” 

“Yes, the young ’uns was alius on the canter after you,” 
declared Maud Eliza, with bitterness, “but I never got 
into a man's eye yit ’t wa’n’t old ’nough to be my daddy. 
Ye alius had plenty to pick’n’ choose from, hi’ I don’t why 
ye don’t freeze onto one o’ em ’n’ give me a chance. 
It’s hoggish — that’s what it is, ’n’ if ye was a lady ye’d 
a-stopped it long ago.” 

This was a subject on which Maud Eliza felt deeply, 
and which had early confirmed in her a republican belief 
in the injustice of the advantages of primogeniture. When 
she was at liberty to discourse at length on her wrongs 
she usually employed the historical method of treating 
the subject, beginning with an early admirer who had 
been drawn from her to her sister, and pursuing a chron- 
ological sequence of similar instances down to the pres- 
sent day — now and then transcending the limits of time 
and circumstance and bearing away into a wild prophetic 
future, in which she constrained history to repeat itself 
through cycles of disappointment and spinsterhood. 
However, it was evident that Maud Eliza was not hope- 
less of a shaping of events which should ultimately evolve 
a matrimonial victim, for even in her most reproachful 
moods she had been known to titter in delighted anticipa- 
tion. Maria always experienced something like disgust 
at these demonstrations. She never could understand 
what a woman wanted of a husband. It seemed to her 
that men were at best a poor makeshift of the Creator at 
a moment when there was a scarcity of good feminine 
material. 

“Well, there ! ” she said, when Maud Eliza had finished 
her tirade; “ye’ve fired yer wad, ’n’ can keep still a 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


45 

while, I hope. I’d like to see the feller I’d let come lally- 
gaggin’ aroun’ me” 

“Ah, Lord A’mighty,” cried Maud Eliza with irony. 
“ Ain’t she greens ? Don’t she think she’s some ? ” And 
she went off into a fit of grasping her nose and strang- 
ling. 

“When Mariar gets married,” Ephraim condescended 
to say with a touch of fatherly pride, “she’ll make it snow 
fer some o’ ’em, ye can bet yer life o’ that. She’s the 
Devil’s Own, Mariar is ! ” 

“ It’s nat’ral for a gal to want to git a man,” put in Mrs. 
Pugsley as if touching upon a subject which demanded 
nothing less than her own large previous knowledge be- 
fore it could be pursued to advantage. “ I ’member how 
’twas with me when I was a gal.” 

“ Them orter have ’em ’t wants ’em,” said Maria. 

“’N’ Maud Eliza does want ’em, o’ course, ’n’ quite 
right,” declared Mrs. Pugsley, regarding her younger 
daughter with complaisance. “ She’s all Swipes, Maud 
Eliza is, in that. There never was a Swipes ’t didn’t marry 
young ; it’s alius been the remarks o’ people ’t the hull 
breed o’ Swipeses went off like hot cakes. It’s their nater 
— iPs in the blood.” 

“ Well, I’d like to know what a woman’s fer if ’tain’t to 
git married?” challenged Maud Eliza, conscious of the 
advantage of defending a conventional idea. 

“ Nothin’ ’t I know on,” answered Maria, grimly. “To 
git married ’n’ be knocked aroun’ instid o’ a sand-bag when 
their husban’s is drunk — that’s what wimmin’s made fer.” 

“ ’N’ I intend to git married the very fust chance,” con- 
tinued Maud Eliza. “’N’I’d rather have a young man 
’n a old ? un any day, though I’d ruther have an old ’un 
’n none at all.” 

Mrs. Pugsley brightened like a mist in sudden sun- 
shine. 


46 IN THE VALLE Y OF HA VILAH. 

“ D’ye hear that, Ephraim ? ” she cried with joy. ‘ 1 She’s 
Swipes all over ! ” 

Maud Eliza tittered her acknowledgments. 

“Though, for the matter o’ that,” pursued the moist 
woman with an air of rightful ownership, “ I alius knowed 
it from the very fust start ’t she was ’er mother’s own 
child ’n’ took after the family. Maud Eliza,” she added 
in solemn adjuration, “ye’ve started right; a gal orter 
marry, — she orter try to make ’er own market ’cause they’s 
more satisfaction in it ’n what they is in dependin’ on 
her parents. I’m yer own mother, ’n’ I tell ye fer yer 
own good ’t ye orter marry; ’n’ I’ve had experience.” 

Maria smiled. It was one of her mother’s inconsisten- 
cies to insist on the wisdom of her marriage even while 
she deplored the consequences of it. 

Ephraim was silent, but not from lack of interest in the 
subject. Indeed, speculations on this very theme at odd 
times had revealed to him latent powers of imagination 
which he had never suspected; and he had often dram- 
atized himself present at the first meeting of one of his 
daughters with a good-natured son-in-law elect, looking 
on as benignantly as Deity might have done when Eve 
was presented to Adam. He had also allowed his im- 
agination to picture himself wandering blissfully against 
an infinitely varied background of saloon sign-boards, 
the recipient of regularly-paid sums of money sufficient 
for a man’s necessary expenses. He believed Maria might 
have been married long ago if she had wished. Her 
objections were inexplicable. 

Mrs. Pugsley was just opening her lips for another 
ebullition of maternal instruction when there was a pre- 
monitory steady sinking of the front wheels of the wagon, 
a soft settling together of thick mud around the hubs, 
then motionless silence. Maria at the rear of the wagon 
could hear the tired horses breathe as they laid them- 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


47 

selves forward to the ground in "their attempt to go on. 
Mr. Pugsley cut at the poor beasts furiously with his 
whip, roaring and cursing like one possessed. But all to 
no purpose. The wagon would not move. Presently 
the horses, dead tired with their hard morning’s labor, 
and realizing the uselessness of further exertion, settled 
back loosely in their traces and submitted to his vicious 
lashings without the quivering of a muscle. 

He had owned the animals long enough to know what 
that meant. They were worse than Maria when they 
had made up their minds as to what they wouldn’t do. 
With ludicrous suddenness he lapsed from imprecation to 
invitation in the desperate hope that a change of tone 
might induce a change of intention in the worn-out beasts. 

“ Good ponies ! ” he said in a voice of smothered pas- 
sion which he tried to make tender with pleading. 

But the horses did not budge. 

“ Git up !” he proceeded in a tone of gentle induce- 
ment. 

Still they did not move. 

“ Get up ! ” he repeated, wheedlingly. 

This mild request being also disregarded, he howled at 
the top of his voice : 

“ Git up, there, Bony parte, d — n ye, or I’ll splinter the 
dumburned ribs o’ ye ! ” 

But the wagon was stuck fast. Mr. Pugsley sank back 
with a hollow groan. Travellers were few and far be- 
tween at that season, and no help could be expected from 
other sources. And the tavern at Havilah — 

The much-tried man turned purple. There is a limit 
even to extreme forbearance ; and we know that the gods 
themselves were capable of anger. 

With a sudden movement, implying that chaos had 
come again, he flung the reins upon the horses’ backs 
and leaped out into the mud. Next, he deliberately 


4 g IN THE VALLEY OF II A VI L AH. 

kicked the. nearest horse in the ribs, grunting with a 
sense of ease as he did so ; then he walked around the 
wagon kicking each wheel impartially in turn and fin- 
ished up in an orderly manner on the ribs of the other 
horse. After that, he seized a muddy wheel in both 
hands and stood shaking it in breathless, impotent rage. 
Then catching sight of Mrs. Pugsley’s frightened face 
peering out through a rent in the canvas, he made a 
blind, murderous dash at her and commenced clambering 
into the wagon directly at her side. 

“ I’ll lam ye ! ” he yelled, clutching and clawing to 
get in, “ I’ll larn ye, ye jade ! ” 

Mrs. Pugsley had never before seen her husband so 
murderously angry. She drew back screaming, and 
calling in a terrified voice for Maria. 

But before Ephraim’s perceptions were able to over- 
come the momentum of his emotions he felt a shock at 
both ends of his spine and an instant later was conscious 
of an identity like his own seated in the mud by the road- 
side with Maria’s strong hands in the region of his collar 
and Maria’s face close to his like an avenging fury. In 
another instant he felt himself seized and lifted and then 
abandoned to the iron grasp of gravity ; which process, 
interspersed regularly with a series of dull splashes in the 
mud, was continued all day long, it seemed to him. And 
when it finally ceased he discovered that he was seated 
in the road, under a sky full of uncertain suns, his hat 
beside him, and Maud Eliza tittering at him from behind 
a rag of the wagon cover. He glanced around him help- 
lessly, then by degrees he commenced to weep, until in 
the course of two or three minutes Pius ^Eneas himself 
might have envied that flow of tears. Oh, what a place 
this world was ! What had it been created for, anyway? 
And he a man, too, to be treated like this. The thought 
formed a stage in the approach of unconsciousness. Pres- 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


49 


ently he ceased weeping and ‘experienced a gradual 
sense of fading out into nothing. Then his mind became 
a blank. 

As for Mrs. Pugsley, the sight of her husband in that 
condition seemed only less terrible than the sight of him 
clambering into the wagon with murder in his eyes, and 
she collected herself for a prolonged outburst of wailing 
and lachrymation ; but a sense of inadequate powers 
constrained her, and she sank back with a decrescendo of 
moist groans, and lay quite still, in wet, tragic passivity. 
Maria, calm in the persuasion that she had done her 
duty, climbed back into the wagon and sat there quietly, 
listening to the river which flowed close at hand. The 
novel motionlessness of the wagon was not unpleasant 
to her ; it gave her a chance to rest her back against the 
wagon-box without danger of dislocation. And then, 
she could hear the river so much plainer; and she had 
always liked the music of water lapping its margin softly 
and mingling with the hoarser sound of the middle 
current. 

She bent over and smoothed back her mother’s dis- 
ordered, unhealthy locks, and tucked the tumbled blank- 
ets into more comfortable order. Words of endearment 
would have sounded strange on her lips ; had they come 
to her she would have left them unuttered from a sense of 
restraint and shame. Her education, or lack of educa- 
tion, had unfitted her for the expression of any slighter 
emotions than indignation and wrath. Her feelings 
were sealed up within her ; she herself was not dis- 
tinctly conscious of any of them except anger. There 
had been no influence about her from her babyhood up 
to develop her affections ; everything had tended to blunt 
her sensibilities, to make her coarse and unwomanly. 
Her material wants were supplied when she had three 

4 


50 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH, 


meals a day ; her spiritual life was complete when her 
father’s supply of grog was such as to insure her mother 
against ill-treatment. There were times, indeed, when 
remote influences touched and stirred her, when faint 
voices reached her inward ear brokenly, as if they could 
tell her glad tidings, were she not so far away. Some- 
times when she sat by running water until the sound 
filled her brain and benumbed all power of thought 
beyond the slow consciousness of freedom and rhythm, 
she had come to herself with a start, and her 'past seemed 
for a time like the memory of an insane hour ; and some- 
times when she watched the stars — the good thoughts of 
angels before they became angels — a momentary shiver- 
ing desire came over her to be like them, immutable and 
high and pure. But conceptions of a better life did not 
insist themselves upon her, did not trouble her except as 
vague suggestions, formless against gloom. Her history 
was as simple as that of a crystal : she existed, and 
grew from the outside. 

And yet the woman’s nature in her, working as silently 
and resistlessly as the circulation of her blood, feeling the 
need of something to care for that its claims to existence 
might not be ignored, had gradually centered all its 
dumb, instinctive craving on the ill-used, complaining 
mother, whose weakness was a constant appeal to the 
daughter’s generosity and strength. Maria’s regard for 
her mother was not love nor tenderness, nor even affec- 
tion, as we understand those terms. It was the armed 
outgoing of a strong nature for the protection of the weak, 
a sympathetic resentment for injury and injustice ; it was 
an instinct rather than a reason, an emotion of the body 
rather than of the soul. But it was her closest approach 
to womanhood thus far, and there had been times as long 
ago as she could remember when a sense of misery crept 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA II. 


51 


over her at the thought of hearing no more the mother’s 
insistent wailing and complaining. It was the only- 
demand that had ever been made upon her spiritual 
energies, and to lose it was like losing the power of loco- 
motion. 

The true sources of character are a thousand insignifi- 
cant rivulets among the unexplored hills and valleys of 
experience. Maria’s life, with its impetuous shallows, 
its dangerous pools and muddy currents was by no means 
a picturesque or inviting stream in the human landscape ; 
but there was good, wholesome sunshine upon it, and 
here and there a thread of crystal clearness forced its way 
through the turbid waters, never wholly losing itself in 
the darker currents around it. She was a creature of 
large possibilities. Nature had done much for her to 
begin with, but Maria had never learned to fill up with 
Art the places left vacant by Nature. Life had made no 
definite impression upon her, but the future would make 
or mar her. Her virtues were in reality monstrosities, 
deformed in obvious ways, like the fabled race of men who 
could hide under their own ears, or at best, ridiculous in 
some less important feature, like the deities in Egyptian 
hieroglyphics who have no hair. As for love, it had 
never touched her, except to move her to laughter or 
scorn. There was a “fierceness of maidenhood” which 
built a barrier of reserve and fear between her and those 
who would approach too closely. Her convictions as to 
what she wanted and did not want were fixed and in- 
superable ; and she was perfectly sure she did not want 
a husband. One husband in the Pugsley family was 
enough, and her mother was welcome to him. 

Maria lived as the trees do among the rocks ; she had 
grown quietly into the distorted shape into which circum- 
stances crowded her, yet was ignorant of her deformity, 


5 2 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


never having known the rectitude of symmetry. Her 
most vivid recollections outside the repeated family 
“rows/’ in which she played so prominent a part, were 
of several never-to-be-forgotten occasions when she had 
been obliged to go longer without eating than was com 
ducive to the comfort of her insides. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH 


53 


CHAPTER VI. 

“ Hello, there, old ’un ! What’s up ? Got stuck ’n’ can’t 
pull loose ? ” 

Mr. Pugsley’s mental blankness had changed to a haunt- 
ing half-consciousness that he was dead, and that instead 
of being buried decently, he had been left by his family 
—even in death his domestic troubles were with him — to a 
gradual decay in the foreground of a moist, unlovely land- 
scape. He was not sure of distinguishing rightly the 
words which broke in upon this condition of nightmare, 
but the hearty human voice touched him with a thrill of 
generous warmth and seemed to stay for a moment the 
process of dissolution. He opened his eyes and gazed 
around him like a partially resurrected body on Judgment 
Day ; he looked down at his legs, at his hands, doubting 
that they belonged to him. Had he awakened in the land 
of spirits ? And was this his spiritual body or the same 
old mass of earthly flesh, blood, and thirstiness from which 
he had hoped he was parted forever ? And the smiling, 
red-headed stranger yonder, astride a strong gray horse 
and leading its mate of exactly the same size and color — 
what vision, what dream of a vision was that? For of 
course it could not be real. Either it was a phantom con- 
jured up by an overwrought sense of frustration and mis- 
ery, or a celestial horseman out for an airing in the fields 
of Paradise. 

Yes, he must be dead, and this was a messenger sent 
to bear him to the realms of bliss and perpetually satisfied 
thirst. 

“ How long ’ve I been dead? ’N’ who the devil air 


54 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


ye?” He articulated with as much difficulty as if using 
his voice for the first time in years ; then he held up his 
muddy hands and shook his head at them in mournful 
gravity. “They ain’t mine, I can take my dyin’ oath o’ 
that. My han's had more feelin’ in 'em ’n’ what them air 
woodeny things ’s got. They’ve gone ’n’ made a mistake 
—they’ve give me the wrong han’s.” 

The stranger laughed, comprehending Mr. Pugsley’s 
psychic entanglement. He had a pleasant laugh alto- 
gether. 

“Ye can’t seem to take me all in, ole feller,” he said, 
in the informal tone of one who is assured of being in the 
presence of friends. He pulled at the rope by which he 
led the second horse, and the big animal splashed obedi- 
ently forward a step or two. “ Lord, I’m reel ’nough, 
nobody ain’t reeler ’n’ I be. I ain’t no ghost ’n’ ain’t got 
no intentions o’ bein’, ’n' don’t ye fergit it ! ” 

Maud Eliza, who had been tittering all day for her own 
amusement, now thrust her head from behind the wagon 
cover to titter for the amusement of the stranger, and was 
paid for her trouble by a facetious nod and wink. 

“Ye jes' bet I’m reel,” he declared with smiling de- 
cision. 

Mr. Pugsley rose with difficulty to his feet. He looked 
like a vertical mud-puddle miraculously endowed with 
powers of locomotion. 

“Ye’re a rather hard-lookin’ pilgrim,” remarked the 
stranger with another laugh. It seemed an easy, habitual 
thing for him to laugh. His life overflowed with such 
unreasoning happiness as does running water, a flash in 
the sun. W’y, ye look like ye’d been a-settin’ down in 
the mud — darn my fool soul if ye don’t ! ” 

At this graceful bon mot Maud Eliza exploded with a 
hollow sound, and retired precipitately behind the wagon- 
cover to collect the fragments. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


55 

There was evidently no intentional sarcasm in the stran- 
ger’s personalities, and Mr. Pugsley saw none. His mind 
had commenced to act again, but not critically, as the 
stranger seemed to expect. A sudden hope filled him. 
There was still something to live for ; there was still 
whiskey in the world — perhaps in this travellers pocket. 
Mr. Pugsley seemed to grow broader and taller in accom- 
modation for this growing faith. 

“ Whoever ye be,” he cried, cordially. “ I’m roarin’ 
glad to see ye, ’iP d’ye happen to have a drop o’ nose-paint 
anywheres about yer close ? ” 

“ Ye may lay yer las’ dollar I have,” was the equally 
cordial response. “Never go out o’ doors ’thout it. 
’Taint safe in this country. Snake-bites, ye know ! ” 
Here the stranger produced a comfortable-looking bottle 
and handed it to Mr. Pugsley with a knowing wink. 

Ephraim returned the wink fraternally with his bleared 
left eye, while he raised the bottle to his lips with a long, 
delicious, anticipatory sigh. 

“Here’s lookin’ at ye, stranger,” he said. And then 
there was an interval of silent ecstasy. 

“ I wish’t I could run onto a flowin’ spring o’ that stuff,” 
he remarked, after a long pull, and a strong pull holding the 
bottle at arm’s length and regarding it with affectionate 
admiration. “I’d build a homestid ’n’ settle down to a 
comftable ole age — that’s what I’d do !” 

He took another blissful draught and then gave a moist, 
convivial wink at the landscape in a general way. 

Maud Eliza had got herself together in tolerable shape 
again and had thrown back a part of the canvas so that 
the interior of the wagon was exposed to the stranger’s 
view. Maria was sitting cross-legged and composed like 
a Turk, while Mrs. Pugsley lay, apparently unconscious 
of everything, even of the sun’s shining into her half-open 
mouth. The young man turned toward the women with 


IN THE VALLEY OF II A VI L AH, 


5<5 

a knowing look, at the same time nodding sidewise at 
Ephraim as if appreciating the old un’s enjoyment and 
calling on them to participate with the due heartiness of 
consanguinity. Especially his eye rested on Maria, who 
did not seem particularly pleased. 

At Ephraim’s mention of a homestead beside a flowing 
spring of whiskey, Mrs. Pugsley stirred feebly and raised 
herself on her elbow, shaking her head drearily. 

“Ye wouldn’t git no comfort out o’ sech a homestid if 
ye had it,” she croaked, clutching at the side of the wagon 
as if to save herself from gliding down a slippery incline. 
“They’d be dozens o’ squatters claimin’ they was there 
afore ye was horned. They ain’t no comfort in this ’eer 
world, nohow ; ’n’ they ain’t no use tryin’. Everything ’s 
wrong 'n’ crooked. ” 

“There, dad, that’s ’nough,” cried Maria, somewhat 
sharply, as Mr. Pugsley removed the bottle from his lips 
once more and stood clasping it protectingly in both 
hands. “ Now give back the bottle. Three swigs like 
them ’s ’nough for anybody. Ye don’t want more ’n, jes’ 
what’ll make ye feel good — ye’ll be howlin’ drunk if ye 
keep on. He alius howls when he gits too full,” she 
added in explanation to the stranger. She made not the 
slightest effort to cloak her father’s failings. Indeed, she 
had become so accustomed to them, and had seen so little 
else in the twenty years of her life, that she had learned 
to regard them as one phase of the natural order of things 
and hardly as failings at all. In the social sense, she was 
as primitive, as rudimental as protoplasm itself. For the 
weaknesses of the masculine character she had a crude 
limited forbearance which she indulged, inasmuch as it 
strained her powers of admonition less than a spirit of 
intolerance, and implied various superior traits of her 
own. 

Mr. Pugsley handed back the bottle compliantly. It 


IN THE VALLEP OF HA VILAH. 


57 

was wonderful to observe the effect of a little warmth 
on his inside. His face beamed with satisfaction. His 
bleared left eye winked indiscriminately at the river, the 
mountains and the sky, as if including them in a con- 
vivial fraternity with himself; he dilated and overflowed 
with good feeling toward the stranger, his own family 
and all the world. Especially did his heart swell with 
pride as his glance fell on Maria, who had just evinced so 
filial and intelligent an interest in his welfare. 

“She's a good ’n," he said to the stranger, spreading 
his feet wide apart in the mud and jerking his head to- 
ward Maria. “ She’s a d — n good 'un, / tell ye ! Look at 
'er, stranger, look at that air gal — my oldes' gal. Look 
at 'er eyes 'n' nose 'n' han’s. 'N ’ look at them cheeks ! 
D’ye ever see a tomater redder or healthier ? Or a piney 
redder 'n' healthier ? Look at 'er, stranger, 'n' answer me 
that ! ” 

He thrust his thumbs into the pockets of his vest, drew 
himself up with a swaying movement, and beamed on 
Maria with more than fatherly pride and affection. The 
stranger glanced from one to the other with the smiling 
curiosity of a child. 

Maria did not seem to resent this public exposition of 
her charms. 

“ Dad ain't never the same two minutes afore V after 
he's had a swoller o’ whiskey," she said. 

Ephraim with difficulty mounted a rounded boulder by 
the wayside and stood there in a sort of flaccid dignity, 
leering like a satyr. 

“ 'N'she knows what’s good for 'er old daddy," he 
proceeded with increasing rapture. “She knows when 
he's got 'nough on the inside o' him, every time. 'N' 
better n he knows hisself, too. Lor ! she knows. What 
don't she know ? " He slapped his muddy overalls with 
emphasis. “Sech jedgment as that gal has ! Sech jedg- 


IN THE VALLE V OF HA VILAH. 


58 

ment ’n’ percepshun ’n’ imaginashun ! W’y she’s a prodi- 
gal, stranger — that’s what she is — a downright prodigal ? ” 
(The enthusiastic father probably meant prodigy, but in his 
present state of exhilaration the reader will doubtless allow 
him a latitude of expression independent of dictionary def- 
initions) “ ’N’ as fer shape — man alive, jes’ look at that air 
gal’s shape ! Aint she a strapper? Ain’t she a bouncer? 
Ain’t she a — ” 

“ Oh, shet up, dad !” remonstrated Maria. “Ye alius go 
too fur. Pick up yer hat ’n’ put’ it on, ’n behave yerself ! ” 

Mr. Pugsley came down from his pedestal and obeyed 
all these commands — except the last — and looked more 
demoralized than ever under the doubtful protection of his 
muddy brim. 

“ Where d’ye git the raise o’ that hat?” cried the 
stranger with his keen enjoyment of everything. “Oh, 

I see. Ye was settin’ down there makin’ it out o’ the 
mud when I come up ’n’ disturbed ye ! ” 

At this Maud Eliza collapsed, clutching wildly at her 
diaphragm. 

Had it been possible to affix some standard of gradua- 
tion to Mr. Pugsley’s waistcoat, like the scale of a ther- 
mometer, to measure the influence of alcohol on senti- 
ment, it would have been interesting to observe how the 
husband’s opinion of his family may rise in direct pro- 
portion to his internal warmth. 

“A finer fam’ly,” he cried with effusion, slapping his 
thigh with a lively sense of domestic felicity, “can’t be 
found nowheres, ye hear me! My fam’ly — my soul 
swells up, stranger, whenever I think o’ my fam’ly. 
What ’ud I do ’thout ’em ? Nothin’. Where ’d I be 
thout’em? Nowheres.” He waved his hand in a con- 
firmatory manner, slapped his thigh again, and was pre- 
paring to proceed, when Maria interrupted him. 

“Ye’d git a idee ’t dad was a big man, wouldn’t ye, 


IN THE VALLE Y OF HA VILAH. 


59 

stranger, to hear ’im talk ? Well, he is a big man. I’ve 
often asked ’im if it don’t hurt to go walkin’ the earth 
permiscus the way he does, knockin’ his head agin the 
stars. ” 

But Ephraim took no notice of this sarcasm. He pro- 
ceeded with an air of lofty, uncorrupted sentiment. 

“That other gal in the middle there, that’s Maud 
Elizy, my younges’, ’n’ the liveliest, chipperest, laffinest 
critter ye ever see — ’s happy all day long ’s a bird on the 
bough.” Maud Eliza testified to the truthfulness of this 
rhapsody by a volcanic snort from the rear apartments of 
her nose. “ It ’ud warm yer heart jes’ to hear ’er laff ’n’ 
take on. She cheers many a mournful hour with ’er 
sweet, chatterin’ ways.” 

“ Maud Elizy ’s Swipes all over, every grain o’ ’er,”put 
in Mrs. Pugsley with a touch of maternal pride. 

“’N’ the ole gal there,” continued Ephraim, brought to 
a knowledge of his wife’s presence by the sound of her 
voice, “That’s Mis’ Pugsley, stranger, the pardner o’ my 
joys ’n’ sorrers. (I’m Ephraim P. — ’n’ very happy to 
make yer acquaintance). She’s a good ’un, too, — one ’t 
ye don’t see the like of every day o’ the week, lemme tell 
ye ; a leetle down in meat jes’ now ’n’ not over lively, 
but a woman as is wuth ’er weight in gold, ’n’ is the pride 
o’ ’er husban’s heart/’ Ephraim wiped away a tear and 
Mrs. Pugsley groaned. “Ye do’ know what a trouble 
’tis to me ’t she ain’t fatter ’n what she is. I feed ’er high 
— it can’t be that — she has things in the way o’ grub ’t 
’ud founder a hoss — ” 

“ I have everything I need, ’ceptin’ham sandwitchers,” 
said Mrs. Pugsley. 

“It’s in ’er fam’ly,” proceeded Mr. Pugsley, with affec- 
tionate feeling. “They was all thin — ye couldn’t fatten 
’em no more ’n ye could fatten a barb-wire fence. It 
wa’n’t in ’em. Their nater was agin it. They was fust 
rate blood, the Swipses was, all o’ ’em, but they wouldn’t 


6o 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


fatten wuth a cent. That was their one fault — the) 
wouldn’t fatten wuth a d — n cent.” 

Mrs. Pugsley looked at the stranger with something like 
a rightful claim to his attention. 

“The Swipeses was all fust-rate blood,” she affirmed, 
with as much pride as if she were the descendant of 
kings. “They wa’n’t no better nowheres. They was 
Southerners ; they come from Arkansaw. The ole breed o’ 
Swipeses lived there year in *n’ year out. I’ve heerd dad 
say with my own ears ’t they wa’n’t no better fam’ly in 
the state ’n his’n, nor nowheres else. They had every- 
thing they wanted in them days. That was ’fore dad 
come to Californy ’n’ got misfortnit ’n’ busted up in biz- 
ness. ” 

“It’s a game country back there, I’ve heerd,” said the 
stranger, as the old woman paused to push her moist 
hair out of her eyes. 

“I ain’t ’shamed o’ bein’ a Swipes,” she continued, 
speaking in a tone of formal dignity that made the 
stranger want to laugh. “Everybody in Stanislaus 
knowed Dad Swipes. He was the fust man to Swipes' 
Bar. He -had a saloon there, ’n’ he knowed how to run 
things. I was alius genteel in the matter o’ flesh. So 
was dad. So was marm. So was all the Swipeses fust ’n’ 
last — I’ve heerd dad say so. I ain’t alius lived like this 
’ere,” she added, sighing. Then she settled back with 
the deprecation of a sensitive nature which has been 
forced by adversity to expand in an uncongenial medium. 

“Speak to ’er, stranger,” urged Mr. Pugsley, who had 
listened to these observations with emotion. “It’s a 
thing ye’ll be glad to ’member till yer dyin’ day — the 
Swipeses wa’n’t no slouches, I can tell ye that ; ’n’ they 
ain’t ’nother sech a woman ’s my Melissy under the 
shinin' sun.” And he wiped his eye on a muddy coat- 
sleeve, without perceptible effect on his dubious com- 
plexion. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


61 


CHAPTER VII. 

Thus adjured, the stranger approached the moist 
woman with hardly more awkwardness than a civilized 
man would have manifested at a similar demand on his 
social powers. Mrs. Pugsley was certainly a formidable 
person for a light-hearted, fun-loving young man to 
address at close quarters. But Maria’s eyes were upon 
him, and a knowledge of that fact filled him with a desire 
to be grave and respectful — a state of mind which was 
a new sensation to him. He instinctively perceived that 
Mrs. Pugsley wouhd construe a Look of sympathetic sor- 
row as a compliment to her talent for wretchedness, so 
he lengthened his face, as if viewing a prospect of unin- 
terrupted woe, though even then his features had an un- 
deniable upward tendency ; then, to use his own expres- 
sion, he “waded in.” 

“I hope ye feel purty well, ma’am,” he said; but 
observing that her appearance did not justify such a 
hope, and believing that she would resent the expression 
of it, he added: “Leastways, purty well fer a lady in 
yer present state o’ health. I’m sure ye look very bad, 
ma’am. ’N’ I hope ye like the weather — which mus’ 
be tryin’ to a lady o’ yer dellycut constitution.” He 
was afraid even now of having spoken too cheerfully, 
and therefore changed the subject abruptly. “’N’ my 
name ’s Bling, ma’am — Billy Bling — ’n’ I’m a miner o’ 
Havilah. I hope ye feel ruther better, ma’am — least- 
ways not much worse ? ” 


62 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


“Don’t ask me how I feel, young man ! ” cried the 
moist woman, tragically. “If ye knowed half what I 
suffer, it ’ud keep ye wake o’ nights ! ” 

“Pore ole ma!” said Maria, half wistfully. “She 
alius talks like she feels ’s if she ’d been picked up some’r’s 
by accident.” 

Billy secretly thought she looked so, too ; but he did 
not venture to say it. 

“I’m sure, ma’am — ” he began. 

“It’s nothin’ but sorrer, sorrer, sorrer,” went on Mrs. 
Pugsley. “Nothin’ but sorrer; fer every joy they’s a 
thousan’ sorrers. I’m sure I alius try to be joyful ’n’ 
chipper ’n’ put my best foot foremost — nobody more so — 
’n’ even my own fam’ly ’s deceived ’n’ goes a-wonderin’ 
how I keep up the way I do. They don’t see ; they don’t 
symp’thize. They never heerd how the moon ’s dark on 
t’ other side. Oh, my side — oh, my liver ! I wonder if I 
can ever fergive God A’mighty fer lettin’ me suffer in this 
’ere way. I ain’t done nothin’ to ’im. /’ve alius let ’im 
alone. Then what makes ’im git a holt o’ me like this ? 
I wish ’t I’d a’ died when I could a’ had Swipes writ onto 
my tombstun — I do, I do ! ” 

“ I’m sure, ma’am — ” Billy commenced again. 

“But it can’t last long,” breathed Mrs. Pugsley, finding 
herself the centre of some attention, and resolving to 
make the most of her opportunities. “I’ll go over some 
day, I know I will. I’ve been dyin’ fer years, ’n’ now 
here ’t is. Oh, I hope it ’ll be soon ! I wonder what ails 
me ’t I can’t die ? ” 

“Oh, la, ma,” cried Maria, encouragingly. “Don’t 
talk like that. Ye’re wuth twenty dead 'uns this minute. 
Ye won’t be ready to turn up yer toes this many a long 
day yit.” 

Mrs. Pugsley said nothing in answer, but receded into 
a shower of drizzling tears, catching her breath and 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 63 

groaning. After a few minutes, however, she emerged 
long enough to cry in solemn prophecy : 

“I know they ain’t no ham-sandwitchers in Havilah; 
I know it — I feel it in my bones 1 ” 

“Oh, yes, I bet they is,” replied Maria; and then, 
with a smile which caused the stranger to flush clear up 
to the roots of his hair and feel as if he were walking on 
sunbeams, “Mr. Bling ’ll hitch them dandy horses o’ 
his’n onto our waggin’, I’m sure, ’n’ haul us safe into 
Havilah, like the gentleman I know he is ! ” 

“I’m sure ye’re very kind, Miss,” stammered Billy, 
redder than ever. 

“Mr. Bling’s a great admirer o’ ladies, I know,” sim- 
pered Maud Eliza, wondering what kind of an impres- 
sion she had made on the young man’s sensibilities. 

Mr. Pugsley evinced no interest in a speedy arrival at 
Havilah. He was very comfortable. He had mounted 
his pedestal again, and seemed wrapped in the seclusion 
of great thoughts. 

“I was ’jes goin’ to offer,” said Billy, recovering from 
his fit of blushing, and regarding Maria sidewdse with 
shy, boyish admiration. “ I’m on the way to Havilah, 
myself. Lucky, ain’t it ? ” 

“Awful lucky,” assented Maria, cordially. 

Billy got down from the big gray and commenced un- 
hitching Mr. Pugsley’s jaded steeds, preparatory to put- 
ting his own in the traces. Ephraim did not offer to 
assist. He was too busy with the sensation of indefinite 
joy pervading his whole system to think of irrelevant 
details. 

“Ye might think these ’ere horses w r as mine,” Billy 
said, busying himself about the harness, “but they ain’t. 
They’re Jim Hulse’s — he lives up there in the foothills 
beyond the camp. He ’s queer, Jim is — some folks says 
he done a murder some’r’s back in the East, ’n’ can’t git 


64 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


over it — but he ain’t a bad sort o’ feller, if ye take ’im 
right. Ye want to let ’im alone, though, when he’s got a 
streak on — he looks ’s if he’d slap ye flyin’ if ye spoke to 
’im then ; — one o’ that sort, ye know.” He looked up at 
Maria to see whether she was listening, and seeing that 
she was, flushed again and looked confused and happy. 

“ Oh, one o’ the streaky sort,” said she, caring nothing 
about Jim Hulse, but willing to use a little friendly decep- 
tion inasmuch as Billy evidently wanted her to be in- 
terested. 

“ Yes, he’s streaky, Jim is,” continued Billy, deter- 
mined to talk in spite of his embarrassment. “ He reads 
books — he’s got a hull lot o’ ’em in his cabin — ye orter 
see ’em all in a row there over his table. They’s more 
’n I ever seen all told afore.” 

“ I don’t go much on books myself,” declared Maria. 
“ Eddicated folks is alius fools.” 

“ Lor’ ! ” laughed Billy. 

“Anyways, they’ve alius got their noses in the air,” 
corrected Maria. 

“ Well, nose or no nose, Hulse is good friends with me, 
’n’ he couldn’t come for the beasts hisself to-day, so I 
offered, bein’ idle, jes’ to ’commodate. He keeps ’em 
most o’ the time up ’ere to Van Winkie’s in the foothills ; 
I rode out with Van Winkie in the waggin’ las’ night. 
Though I’m sure I d’ know what Hulse wants o’ the 
horses. He ain’t got no use fer ’em. It’s a freak o’ his — 
he’s full o’ freaks.” 

“ Oh,” said Maria, indifferently. She was not equal to 
the task of dissimulating further, even for the sake of 
friendship. 

Billy went on with his work, still smiling. It would 
have given him pleasure to help the Pugsleys— he was 
always assisting strangers with friendly offices, just for 
the pleasure of doing a good turn — even if Maria had not 


IH THE VALLEY OF HA VI L AIL 


65 

been one of their number ; but her presence certainly gave 
value to the mild satisfaction which is the usual recom- 
pense of disinterestedness. Her voice had a ring that he 
had never before heard in the voice of any woman ; it 
certified a personality which was a compound of good- 
fellowship and independence ; he would like to keep on 
doing things forever that would cause her to praise him. 
Innocence, we may believe, is a dream of philosophic 
souls ; but there was as much of that spotless quality in 
Billy's admiration for Maria as it is possible to conceive of 
in the carnal mind of man. It occupied all his energies 
just to think how complete she was, thus leaving no chance 
for baser thoughts. He wished he had seen more of 
women and better knew what pleased them ; he had an 
idea they liked lordly manners and graceful off-hand atten- 
tions, such as characterized the ephemeral flashy gamblers 
of the camp. He was by no means sure that Maria would 
be pleased by such manners, but he could not help wish- 
ing that he knew enough about them to be able to assume 
them at will. She was an event in his life — a suggestion 
of increasing enjoyment through long years to come. 

Though he kept on smiling, it somehow happened that 
when he spoke to Maria he was inclined to maintain a 
respectful seriousness which was quite new to him. It 
was not because Maria was a serious girl — on the con- 
trary. But in her presence he felt as if he would like to 
laugh at such times and in such ways as would please 
her. He could not make up his mind positively whether 
she would like laughing or anything else ; he could 
hardly imagine her likes and dislikes, even in outline. 
And indeed Maria would have puzzled a riper student of 
human nature than Billy Bling. She was as ambiguous 
as an unfinished sentence ; she suggested a multitude of 
meanings and confirmed so few of them. 


5 


66 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


CHAPTER VIII. 

Ephraim’s horses were presently removed and tied to 
the rear of the wagon, where Maud Eliza amused herself 
by flicking their noses with her apron and snickering. 
After letting out several straps in the old harness, the big 
grays were fastened in the traces, and everything was 
ready to start. Then Mr. Pugsley descended serenely 
from his pedestal, mounted the front seat beside Billy, 
and in a moment the wagon was under way. 

“Now, that’s suthin’ like,” declared Maria, approvingly. 

“I’m glad ye like it, Miss,” replied Billy with a pleased 
look. 

“Ain’t this suthin’ like?” asked Maria, turning to her 
mother. 

But the moist woman evidently considered that such an 
admission would be derogatory to her dignity as profes- 
sional mourner, and only answered with a groan. Billy 
noted the kindly tone in which Maria spoke to her mother 
and made up his mind that, whatever her likes and dis- 
likes might be, any little attention he might pay to the old 
lady would not be unacceptable to the young one. He 
was at a loss how to take advantage of this new knowl- 
edge — sympathy seemed to make the old lady worse and 
hopefulness she resented. He determined, however, to 
assist her out of the wagon when they reached Havilah 
— Maria would be sure to notice an attention like that, 
women in Havilah usually scrambled out of wagons as 
best they could, but the laws of custom were not inviol- 
able. He contented himself with thinking how glad he 


IN THE VALLEY 01 HA VILAH. 67 

was of the opportunity to do something for Maria and her 
family. If it were not for him, they might be sitting there 
in the wagon yet, longing for some one to come to their 
assistance. No lover who sees his mistress wearing a gift 
of his conspicuously in a ball-room could feel more hope- 
ful than did Billy at the assurance that Maria accepted his 
services with gratitude. But fear is always the parallel of 
hope, and while he could not help believing Providence, 
who had kindly seconded matters thus far, would, forshame 
of inconsistency, continue propitious, he dreaded the im- 
pression he might be making on this strong-minded young 
woman. Well, no matter ; there was plenty of time. 
Meanwhile, there was the old woman to experiment on. 
She was what Billy called a “ sure thing.” 

“ How pretty the sun looks on the river ! ” said Maria, 
after a long pause. 

“ Don’t it, though ! "cried Billy with delight. His long 
and intimate intercourse with nature had furnished his 
mind with some bold comparisons, and he did not feel 
afraid to express them to Maria. “ D’ye know, it alius 
makes me think ’t the sun s busted ’n’ tumbled into the 
water. ” 

Maria laughed. 

“ Lor, what a idee ? ” she said. Then, after a moment’s 
silence, “ It ain’t bad, though. Most men don ’t think ’o’ 
sech things.” 

Billy answered her with a grateful look which she did 
not see. He thought it was something to the purpose 
that she noticed a favorable difference between him and 
other men. 

“ I used to think a heap more ’bout such things when 
I was a kid,” he said. “ I can ’member mother used to 
tell suthin’ from the Bible ’bout how beautiful upon the 
mountains are the feet o’ him that brings glad tidin’s ; ’n’ 
after I come out ’ere from Ohio — that’s where I was borned 


68 


IN THE VALLEY OR HAVILAH. 


V raised — it come to me all of a heap ’t the big white clouds 
was like that on the mountains — like Christ come to make 
the world glad.” He spoke very seriously, even while his 
lips were still smiling ; but all at once his tone changed as 
if he was fearful of a too solemn turn in the conversation. 
“ They ain’t no ’countin’ fer what ’ll come into a feller’s 
head at odd times — ’specially when ye’re a kid. Some- 
times I ’most wish 't I was a baby agin — it’s sech fun to 
grow up ! Don’t you P ” 

“ No, thankee,” returned Maria with decision. “ I’ve 
had my share o’ growin’ up. I’ll take the rest o’ mine in 
stayin’ big. I’m purty well contented the way I be.” 

“ It’s a fine team, that air,” remarked Mr. Pugsley, who 
was in a mood to praise everything. 

“Jim Hulse wouldn’t keep no other kind, ” was the an- 
swer. “He knows a good piece o’ hoss flesh when he sees 
it, Jim does.” 

“Oh, a judge o’ hoss flesh, eh?” said Mr. Pugsley. 
“Well, well ! that’s good — I like a man ’t knows a dandy 
from a scrub ; ’n’ I’ve alius said I know a fine wooman 
when I see ’er ; she sort o’ fixes ’erself in my eye ’n’ stays 
there. Now, that Mariar o’ mine — ” Mr. Pugsley lowered 
his voice and glanced behind him furtively, “ w’y, that 
gal, stranger, that gal ’ll make some man sech a wife ’s 
’ud be the envy o’ a ’Frisco stockbroker, she will, by 
hokey ! I’ve studied ’er like a father, ’n’ I know.” 

Billy looked impressed, not amused, as he would have 
done had Ephraim spoken thus of Maud Eliza. 

“She is a fine woman,” he said meditatively, as if dwell- 
ing on a blissful idea. 

“Be ye a married man?” continued Ephraim with un- 
sophisticated directness. 

“No.” 

Billy glanced back at Maria. She sat with her hands 
loosely Folded in her lap, and she was laughing. Evi- 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 69 

dently she had heard every word. Billy laughed too, 
though sheepishly. 

“Dad’s awful interestin’, ain’t he, when he gits a little 
full ’11’ commences blowin’ ? ” she said, as his eye met 
hers. > 

Billy flushed, not knowing what to answer. But his 
embarrassment left him like the passing away of an 
opaque obstruction as he discovered in her words an 
opportunity to give her a compliment. He looked into 
her eyes with his old unconstrained laugh. 

“Not half ’s interestin’ ’s what you be/’ he replied, 
gallantly. 

“ Oh, now, you ! ” cried Maria, in smiling reproach. 

Maud Eliza, whose curiosity had gradually overcome 
her jealousy of her sister, had been holding her breath 
for fear of losing a word of this novel conversation. All 
at once she gave a tempestuous snort and hid her head in 
her apron. 

Billy did not notice. He was too busy with his com- 
pliment. 

“ Oh, I ain’t foolin’,” he declared. “Ye be interestin’.” 
He was determined to be understood, but Maria only 
shook her head in incredulous protest. 

Here Mr. Pugsley broke into the conversation by 
nudging his new acquaintance in the ribs with an air of 
secrecy. 

“ Gimme ’nother drop o’ bug-juice, stranger,” he said, 
in a whisper. 

“Don’t ye do it/’ called out Maria, who seemed to 
hear everything. “He’s had all he needs for the pres- 
ent, ’n’ he shan’t have no more. The wind’s in that 
direction, ’n’ every time he opens his mouth now it s like 
somebody opened a bar’l o’ whiskey ; 'n’ that’s ’nough 
fer any man.” 

Mr. Pugsley subsided with childlike obedience. 


70 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


“That gal knows what’s good fer me,” he said. 
“She’s a gal o’ sperrit ’n’ imaginashun. Whenever I go 
to do anything out o’ the way ye ’ll hear ’er commence to 
roar like a dose o’ quinine. She knows. She’s got a 
conscience ’t ’s alius on the rampage, Mariar has.” 

Suddenly he nudged Billy once more. 

“Say, be ye purty well off?” he asked. 

“ Not p’tickler,” was the answer. 

“Oh ! ” murmured Ephraim in a tone of waning en- 
thusiasm. 

“I’ve got prospecks o’ a purty good thing, though — 
the best prospecks ’t ’s been seen in Havilah sence the 
ole boom.” 

“I don’t go much on prospecks,” declared Mr. Pugsley. 
“I’ve had ’em myself more ’n wunst — I’ve alius been 
havin’ ’em ever sence I can ’member — ’n’ they never was 
no good. What I want is facks. Facks is the only thing 
’t counts.” 

He meditated a little while. 

“Ye make ’nough ’ere in the mines to s’port a wife ’n’ 
fam’ly, I reckon ? ” he questioned. 

“ Oh, yes, more ’n’ ’nough fer that.” 

Billy saw plainly the drift of the old man’s remarks, and 
for some reason felt inclined to encourage him. 

Mr. Pugsley settled back with an exhalation of relief. 

“O’ course,” he said, suddenly sitting up again and 
bringing his mouth close to Billy’s ear, “if ye was to git 
married ye wouldn’t have no fam’ly o’ yer own at fust — 
that ’s plain ; so ’t ye could 'ford to keep yer wife’s 
fam’ly, jes’ to ekalize things ? ” 

Billy was serious enough as he answered : 

“If I thought ’nough o’ a gal to marry ’er, I’d be 
willin’ to do all I could fer ’er folks. I’d consider ’em a 
part o’ ’er.” 

Mr. Pugsley beamed. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVIL AH. 


71 

“Ye’re the very man I’ve been lookin’ fer,” he whis- 
pered, in a voice choked with emotion. “’Tain’t every 
feller ’t I’d trust a daughter o’ mine to — ’tain t every 
feller ’t I’d give ’er up to jes’ fer the askin’ in this way. 
But you — God bless ye, my dear young friend, go in ’n’ 
win ’er ’n’ be happy ! ” And Ephraim settled back rapt- 
urously, as if he had beheld an earthward flight of 
heavenly things. 

This paternal disposal of his future did not seem dis- 
agreeable to Billy. But what if Maria had heard this 
whispered conversation, as she had heard those that pre- 
ceded it? How would she take it? He blushed con- 
sciously and cast a hasty look back at her. Her dark 
eyes met his quizzically, and she laid the fore-finger of 
her left hand delicately beside her nose. 

“Lemme give ye a word o’ advice, young feller,” she 
said, with careful explicitness, taking her finger away 
and waving her hand airily. “ I don’t want t’introod on 
yer private bizness, ’n’ I don’t want to force myself into 
the confidence o’ nobody ; but this I’ll say : When ye 
marry, be sure ye git the gal ’n’ not ’er boozy ole 
daddy ! ” 

The young man smiled doubtfully and turned very red. 
Ephraim did not seem to care much that he had been 
overheard ; but he said nothing further, being so content 
with his own internal warmth that any change, even the 
slight one which speech necessitated, seemed a useless 
departure from what was thoroughly agreeable. Billy 
examined the flanks of the horsed with a studious air. 
Maria evidently intended her speech as a rebuff — one 
would think that she was not fond of lovers. But he 
was not going to be discouraged by such a trifle as that. 
If he failed, he would fail trying. That was a good 
motto in courtship as well as in business affairs. “ Fail, 
trying.” He would remember that when she discouraged 


72 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


him — which he imagined would be often. It would 
keep his hopes from running too high, also, for it implied 
a potential failure. But the more difficult her love was to 
win, the more valuable the possession of it would be. 
He would remember that in the midst of all sorts of dis- 
couragements. 

The big horses pulled steadily through the thickening 
mud, their grand muscles swelling with the occasional 
increased strain brought to bear upon them. A cynic 
would have been led to compare the motives of these 
patient, conscientious beasts with the motives of the load 
of poor humanity which they dragged — would have con- 
cluded that if, instead of man, some animals had been 
endowed with dominion over all created things, creation 
might have been the gainer ; but no such propagator of 
unscriptural views was present, and the only voice lifted 
up in protest was Mrs. Pugsley’s wail of impersonal 
reproach whenever the wagon dove downward with un- 
usual violence. 

Billy would like to have kept on saying things expres- 
sive of his admiration for Maria, but he felt afraid ; and 
the right words would not come. What man has ever 
found fitting words with which to address the loveliest 
woman he has ever seen ? The spirit is lost in the letter, 
the rush of feeling is dissipated in the effort intended to 
strengthen it. It was enough, after all, just to sit still 
and think of her — words would come later. He was glad 
— selfishly glad — that he was the first man in Havilah to 
meet her, for this gave him an advantage over all subse- 
quent acquaintances. That she would be at once beset 
by all manner of admirers, he did not for a moment 
doubt. She threw far into the shade all women who had 
been in that part of the country within his recollection. 
Only a short time ago a snub-nosed, freckled girl from 
Petered-Out — a camp on the farther side of the mountains 


m THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


73 


— had made a triumphal entry into Havilah and carried off 
a successful young miner — the biggest catch in camp — in 
less than a week after her arrival. After such evidence of 
the susceptibility of the male portion of the community, 
what quantities of admiration might be expected to fall 
to the share of a girl like Maria. Billy was not a con- 
ceited man, but he had reason to believe that he could 
hold his own, as far as looks went, with the best of 
them in camp; and in spite of Maria’s half-serious dis- 
couragement of his lover-like advances, his hopeful, happy 
temperament could not help picturing agreeable possi- 
bilities. He felt at the beginning of a happy change. 
His future seemed close beside him ; he stepped into its 
clear, shallow current as blithely as a young child steps 
into a running brook. He was still young — only twenty- 
six — and in spite of his semi-barbarous life, the eager 
hopes of youth and early manhood yet lay upon him, as 
wholesome and refreshing as the raindrops of a summer 
shower. 

After a while he turned and looked at Ephraim some- 
what shamefacedly, as if conscious of a selfish intent. 

“Well, ole feller,” he asked, “have ye got a cabin 
spoke fer to live in after ye git to Havilah ? ” 

“Well, no — I ain’t. We ain’t used to houses, nohow. 
We’ll camp in the waggin ; mebbe we’ll run acrosst a 
shanty o’ some sort after a while, but we’re used to the 
waggin.” 

“I wouldn’t do that!” cried Billy eagerly. “ I’ve got 
a cabin there by the river, ’t ain’t been used fer more ’n a 
year. I stay up in the hills mostly, now. Ye can move 
yer traps in there if ye like. It’s a heap better ’n the 
waggin. They’s a stove ’n’ a table ’n’ what not — a lot o’ 
things I didn’t need up in the hills. They’s three rooms, 
too, TT two o’ ’em’s got beds what I bought cheap wunst 
to a auction. Ye’d better make up yer mind to stopt here.” 


74 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


Mr. Pugsley leaned over and laid his hand affectionately 
around Billy’s shoulders, bringing his ill-favored visage 
close to the young man’s ear. 

“That suits me half to death ! ” he cried with enthusi- 
asm. “Ye’ll make some fine man a fine son-in-law one 
o’ these fine days ! ” 

So it was settled, and Billy felt as if a new epoch had 
begun in the history of the world — an event had occurred 
from which time should be computed. The current of his 
life had changed, had touched the current of Maria’s life, 
might flow on beside it or mingle with it, but never return 
to its former channel. He felt very happy in that thought 
— he could never again be as he had been. He would 
have something to work for, something to care for. Love 
is the creative spirit of these days, as of yore. It forms 
a man from the dust of the earth, breathes into him the 
divine breath and makes of him a living soul. Billy gazed 
about him with something like a convalescent’s enjoy- 
ment of old things rejuvenated; he saw everything in a 
new glory ; the mountains, the sky, the river were all 
sharers in his young hopes. How pleasant the world 
seemed — how clear and pure ! The wagon was close to 
the foothills now, and high over his head the wind struck 
an iEolian melody from the pines. Even the dead cedars 
were beautiful, flinging their interlaced shadows like tan- 
gled spiders’ webs across the yellow rocks. Accustomed 
to the sympathetic look and speech of Nature, Billy inter- 
preted the lights and shadows into happy meanings. The 
sunlight sifted through the dark pine branches, making 
a pale blue vapor underneath. His future was like that 
— dim and uncertain, indeed, but with hope streaming 
brightly across the unknown paths. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH 


75 


CHAPTER IX. 

The Pugsley cavalcade, with Maud Eliza snorting with 
undiminished violence in the rear, arrived at the camp of 
Havilah a little after noon. 

Ephraim beamed on the hospitable signboards with be- 
nevolent cordiality., and Mrs. Pugsley evinced signs of 
interest by drawing up her knees under the blankets and 
giving desultory galvanic jerks with her head in the en- 
deavor to obtain an inclusive view of her surroundings. 

“Well, here we air, ma,” remarked Maria, noticing the 
moist woman’s growing interest, and sharing in it with 
rough sympathy. “This is better ’n bein’ stuck in the 
mud out there on the prairie now, ain’t it? Ye mus' 
own up ’t this is better. ” 

“ I ain’t a-denyin’ ’t it’s better. Who said I was ? If I 
have my own idees ’bout things, I reckon I can keep ’em 
to myself if I want to. But that was alius yer way — ye 
want me to keep a howlin’ ’n’ a lettin’ my idees out into the 
world in a constant stream. ’N’ a woman ’s better off as 
keeps ’er troubles to ’erself. ’Tain’t no way to keep a- 
yawpin’. Ye’ll find that out fer yerself when ye git a man 
o’ yer own.” 

The wagon lunged through the street in an uncertain, 
spasmodic way, like an old man in a hurry. Maria bore 
the inspection of the idlers about the saloons with the com- 
posed impudence which prides itself on never being stared 
out of countenance, and Maud Eliza tittered with a delight- 
ed sense of being the cynosure of many masculine eyes. 
The idlers in front of the saloons pointed with dirty index 
fingers at the occupants of the wagon, and an occasional 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


76 

remark was audible, expressing a judicial discrimination 
as to the merits of the respective “shapes’' of the Pugsley 
sisters. Billy was greeted with several cordial “ Hello’s !” 
and aways returned the salutation with the utmost friend- 
liness. 

Before one of the shabbiest of the saloons stood a man 
and a woman, evidently the proprietors of the place, who 
at once fastened Maria's attention. 

“Did ye ever see anything 't was opened up ekal to the 
mouths o’ 'em ? ” she asked of Billy. “ If I was them, I’d 
be afeerd o’ the sun shinin, clean into my stummick ’n’ set- 
tin’ my dinner on fire." 

And Billy laughed, thinking that Maria was the wittiest 
girl he had ever met. 

The man in front of the saloon was very tall and had 
a small head set directly on an immense abdomen, like 
a wart on an apple ; and to add to the incongruity of 
his appearance, his legs were surprisingly long and frail. 
Maria regarded him with ill-concealed amusement. “ He 
looks like a punkin on stilts,” she whispered to Maud 
Eliza, who clutched her side in an agony of giggles. 

The woman was like the fat lady of a side-show — like 
an inverted balloon — like a haystack — like something 
suggestive of the ultimate exhaustion of material. Her 
gown was of faded pink calico, split here and there along 
the seams and fitting tightly across her broad hips ; there 
was a frayed flounce around the bottom, headed with the 
inevitable ‘ bias" which finishes off the feminine costume 
of California mining camps. Her wiry yellow-locks, 
bleached to a dingy white at the ends, suggested a long 
interregnum of anarchy between the present hour and the 
last application of a comb. While regarding the Pugsleys 
with an almost personal interest, she tossed a heavy-look- 
ing baby from one arm to the other, chucking it absently 
under the chin and making it squall wrathfully while 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


77 

intending to soothe and amuse it. Her divided attention 
left her at liberty to poke her fingers into the baby’s eye 
while seeking its chin, and these aimless explorations 
resulted in wild, ineffectual yells of protest from her victim. 

Maria could not resist the temptation to have some fun 
at the fat woman’s expense. She had made sport of 
strangers frequently, when their peculiarities happened 
to amuse her. In a question of manners she was altogether 
without judgment ; she did what pleased her, regardless 
of justice. Probably a large freedom of manners was a 
part of the joy of the Hyperboreans ; I can imagine Maria 
fitting into their savage conditions and enjoying to the full 
the measure of their irresponsible pleasures. 

With a sudden impulse of deviltry she thrust her head 
forward, squinted her eyes, and opened her mouth to its 
utmost extent in exaggerated imitation of the fat woman’s 
look ; then she spread her fingers as far apart as possible 
and held her extended palms on either side of her face as 
if to indicate that a very great expansion of herself was the 
only thing needed to complete the resemblance. After 
holding herself in this attitude for a moment, she let her 
hands fall again into her lap, flung back her head and 
burst into abnormal laughter. 

The fat woman seemed to be of a caloric temperament, 
for at sight of this mirth she deposited the choking baby 
on a beer barrel with more emphasis than tenderness and 
squared herself toward the Pugsleys, her feet spread wide 
and her arms akimbo. Shaking back her variegated locks 
and breathing very hard, she shouted at Maria in a hoarse 
guttural voice : 

“Well, gawp, ye imperdent hussey, why don’t ye? 
Gawp, do ! Prob’ly ye’ll know a lady the nex’ time ye 
git fur ’nough from home to see one. Why don’t ye gawp, 
ye cat ? ’N’ giggle, do ! ye think ye’re some, don’t ye, 

a-settin’ up there with yer bold face ’n’ eyes a-starin’ ’n’ 


y8 IN THE VALLEY OF HA VIL AH. 

snickerin’ at decent folks as could buy V sell ye every 
hour o’ the day ’n’ tween times if they wan’t afeered o’ a 
bad bargain on their hands. Oh, gawp ! we ain’t hansim 
nor stylish nor grinnin’ from ear to ear like some folks, but 
we’re jes’ ’s good’s anybody a-goin’ in this ere world. ’N’ 
ye hear me” she added, as if to hear was to be con- 
vinced. 

Maria’s training had crystallized into two or three well- 
defined principles of action, one of which was, in western 
phrase, “ never to take no sass off m nobody; ” her temper 
was always waiting, like a soldier, the command which 
might lead to conquest. The wagon was almost out of hear- 
ing by this time, but she thrust her head out through the 
tattered canvas and screamed at the top of her voice : 

“ Sass is becomin’ to ye, ole woman — keep it up — its 
yer stronghold ! ye couldn’t look purtier nohow — not if 
ye was sayin’ yer prayers ! ” 

And she laughed as insultingly as she knew how. 

The woman seized her petticoats in one hand, extended 
the other to balance herself and started toward the road 
as if to force Maria to a fist-fight then and there ; but, 
finding the mud too deep for one of her weight, she paused 
by the side of the road and commenced swearing. 

“ I’ll pay ye fer usin’ yer lip on me! ” she screeched in 
a phrenzy of helpless rage. “ Oh, wait 1 I ’ll fix ye when 
I lay hands on ye ! — may the devil pitchfork the heart o’ 
ye ! Won’t I smash ye so’ t ye won’t know yerself fer 
a month ? Won’t I — ” 

The words were inaudible by this time, but Maria in- 
creased the fat woman’s wrath by pointing a derisive 
finger and then grasping her side as if the sight was really 
two comical to be borne. The fat woman still stood be- 
side the road, and at sight of Maria’s continued mirth she- 
again seized her skirts and tried to get forward. But again 
the mud was too much for her. She plunged wildly about 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


79 


for a moment, balancing herself with her disengaged 
hand, but presently was forced to return to dry ground 
where she turned and shook her immense fist after the re- 
treating wagon. Then, after stamping about on the steps 
a short time, she seized her squalling baby from the beer- 
barrel and dashed headlong into the saloon. 

“She’ll take it out on the baby, ” said Billy, half in 
pity. 

“ Well, let’er ! ” cried Maria. “She needn’t think she’s 
goin’ to take it out on me ! I ain’t a sand bag fer no- 
body.” 

“ Well,” said Billy, “ I don’t guess ye air. ’N’ seems 
like ole Sammy’s fin’ly found somebody ’t ain’t afeerd o’ 
’er ! ” 

“ Sammy ? Lor’, what a name for a wooman ! ” 

“Fits ’er purty well, though, don’t it? Her reel 
name ’s Samanthy, but everybody calls ’er Sammy fer 
short. She’s a bad ’un — a reg’lar terror. W’y I’ve heerd 
’er own husban’ say ’t they’s fire ’n brimstun ’nough in that 
wooman to burn up a turnpike road. Everybody’s afeerd 
o’ ’er. ” 

Maria sniffed contemptuously. 

“ Well, / ain’t, ” she said. 

“Maria don’t keer fer nothin’, ” put in Ephraim proudly. 
“ The devil ain’t a patchin’ to my gal Mariar ! ” 

“ I thought she was goin’ to waltz right out through the 
mud ’n’ yank ye out o’ the waggin,” said Billy. “ She’d 
a done it if the mud hadn’t been so deep.” 

“ Would she ? I’d like to ketch 'er at it,” said Maria 
with decision. 

“ She’s got a awful temper.” 

“ So ’ve I.” 

“ But she’s the biggest,” said Billy, amused and admir- 
ing. He liked a woman of spirit — one who could take care 
of herself and enjoy the occupation. 


So 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


“ I don’t keer how big she is,” declared Maria. “ I 
ain’ a-goin’ to set down 'n* be run over by nobody. I 
ain’t a-goin’ to have no ole Sammy nor nobody else 
jumpin’ onto me with both feet V say nothin’ back. I 
guess I’ve got a right to grin. She’d make a fun’ral grin, 
that critter would.” 

“ Ye jumped onto ’er fust,” said Maud Eliza, with unex- 
pected acuteness. 

“ Mariar’s alius joslin’,” declared Ephraim with his 
hoarse cnuckle. “ I seen ’er makin’ faces at the ole critter 
at the very start. She a’n’t afeered o’ God A’mighty, 
Mariar ain’t.” 

“ She’ll git it tuck out o’ ’er when she gits married, 
though,” said Mrs. Pugsley in the tone of a priestess who 
delivers oracular responses. 

“ Well, I like grit in a wooman,” said Billy, with his 
light laugh. f ‘The wimmin need it’s much ’s the men 
does in this country.” 

“ I hate wimmin ’t set aroun’ ’s harmless’s picters,” de- 
clared Maria. “What’s the use o’ a life like that? 
Better be dead to wunst ’n’ done with it. I believe in 
lettin’ folks know I’m aroun’. It’s the least a gal can 
do.” 

‘ ‘ I’m afreed yer ort’n’t to a-done it, though, ” said Ephraim 
with the mild reproof occasioned by judicious after- 
thought. “ I don’t think ye orter — reely.” 

“ Oh, it’ud a-been all right with you if they didn’t keep 
a saloon,” retorted Maria. “Ye’re afeerd they won’t want 
ye loafin’ aroun’ there now — that’s all ’t ails you” 

And Ephraim did not deny the charge. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


8l 


CHAPTER X. 

The cabin which Billy Bling placed at the disposal of 
the Pugsleys was a three-roomed wooden structure, with 
a shaky roof and a veranda. The veranda faced the 
cottonwoods and the river, and commanded a com- 
prehensive view of the far-off mountains ; and at the 
back of the house the ground sloped rapidly up to the 
foot-hills. The house was unpainted, the chimney had 
crumbled, and some of the windows were broken, the 
roof was warped, too, and several clapboards were 
loose, one above the doorway, especially, was hanging in 
a helpless way, as if wondering at its unaccountable de- 
tention in mid-air. The building looked as if a sharp 
wind would cut through it, and as if a storm would 
demolish it. Happily, storms and sharp winds were rare 
in this part of the world, so that the house formed a con- 
venient, if not ornamental, shelter. The veranda had a 
hospitable look, and the yard was even pretentious in its 
magnitude, though the fence was almost obliterated in 
places. The small, blurred windows held a look of phil- 
osophic discernment which made one feel, before enter- 
ing, as if he were about to penetrate the recesses of an 
experienced old man’s brains. Old houses almost always 
have this look of mystery ; it is a part of their .indi- 
viduality. 

Maria liked it at once. It was more homelike than 
anything she had known since her father kept a gin-shop 
in Nevada City, when she was a little child. She experi- 
enced a sudden modification of her conceptions of Havilah. 
AH the houses were not saloons — here was an agreeable 


82 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH, \ 


proof of that fact. H.ere was a place where she could go 
in and out as she chose ; a door to open and shut, and 
windows to look out of whenever she liked, herself 
screened from the passer-by. She commenced to wonder 
why she had never missed this privacy which all at once 
seemed so pleasant; she had never thought of its advan- 
tages at all while obliged to put up with the wagon-cover 
as her only screen from strangers’ eyes, but had rather 
regarded houses as an affectation of weak-minded peo- 
ple. But, with a house of her own, this idea changed 
suddenly. The sense of possession filled her with keen 
enjoyment. The rose-vines, torn loose from their leather 
fastenings, swayed helplessly about the veranda, but she 
touched their leafless branches tenderly as she passed up 
the steps, no longer doubting that she liked flowers, now 
that there was a prospect of having some of her own. 
She mentally resolved that she would nail the vines back 
to their support without delay, and prepare them for such 
a season of blossoming as they had never known before. 
They were mute prophecies of bright colors and sweet 
scents which would be all her own ; and she knew that 
the big drowsy bees would hover about the place a little 
later, filling the air with a noise that would shame the 
shrunken river. And the river was very near — she could 
see it through the leafless cottonwoods, whirling past like 
a river of clouds ; the roar of it came to her ears like the 
roar of a cannonade. "The foothills were but a little way 
off, too, with their shadowy recesses and venerable pines. 
Maria did not usually look at the mountains with much 
attention ; she was used to the changing aspect of rocks 
and trees, and found little or no enjoyment in contem- 
plating them ; there was no movement in them, no soul ; 
they were as stale as imaginations grown familiar by repe- 
tition. But to-day the foothills appeared to her in a new 
light ; they belonged to the surroundings of her home. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH i 83 

The rounded summits of red sandstone looked as softly 
flushed as apples that bask in the October sun. The 
delicate fa9ades that diversified the rocky walls — a trav- 
eller would have discovered in their faint tracery a resem- 
blance to the rock-carved ruins of some Eastern necropo- 
lis — for the first time appeared to her worthy of notice. 
She would see those ridges and chasms every day — they 
would be a part of her external life. But the river, the 
river ! She turned to look at it again ; she was glad 
beyond measure to have it so near her. She always 
thought of running water as a living thing with a human 
voice and human affections, and there had been times 
as she sat listening to it when she could almost imagine 
herself into its experience as it passed outward and on- 
ward all the way from the mountains to the sea. The 
full-fed cattle lying at ease on the shady bank may do as 
much, quite dulled to all consciousness but that of wide- 
reaching enjoyment. 

Billy waited by the wagon and helped Mrs. Pugsley to 
alight, well knowing that Maria was looking on and 
would be pleased with any little attention of that sort to 
her mother ; a simple act of kindness, but which he was 
far-seeing enough to believe would form a link in a chain 
of possible causes. Mrs. Pugsley dropped one shoe at 
the gate, and came the rest of the way up the path carry- 
ing it in her hand, an unmistakable symbol of disintegra- 
tion ; altogether presenting a companion picture to Abaris 
traversing Greece with an arrow in his hand as a symbol 
of Apollo. 

Billy unlocked the rickety door and stood on the 
threshold smiling, waiting for Maria to enter first. She 
gave her hand to her mother, who was climbing the steps 
with some difficulty ; then she turned to him with a glad 
smile. 

“I like it a’ready,” she said, looking into his eyes with 


84 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


frank happiness. “ Ye’re very good to us. It’s better 'r 
what I’m used to.” 

Only a student of the embryology of love could explain 
why Billy turned so red at these words of commendation, 
and why he kept his face shyly turned away, as if fearing 
that she might read the new hope in his eyes. He was 
sure he wanted her to know his real feeling, above all 
things ; but it made him quiver all over with helplessness 
and happiness and silliness whenever he thought of her 
becoming aware of it. 

They went into the house. In a moment Billy was 
out to the wagon again, and in another moment he was 
back with an armful of blankets which he deposited in a 
corner of the room, and Mrs. Pugsley immediately settled 
down upon them like one who has attained an ambition, 
remarking that this was “suthin’ like bein’ a Swipes.” 
She had a stranded look in such dry surroundings. Maria 
regarded everything with the cheerfulness born of favor- 
able contrast. She felt as proud and happy as if a royal 
demesne had suddenly fallen to her by inheritance ; and 
indeed such a habitation is by no means to be despised 
in a land where circumstance, the crude lexicographer, 
makes utility synonymous with luxury. 

“ ’Tain’t nothin’ extry,” said Billy, apologetically, “But 
I reckon it’ll be more comf’table ’n the waggin. They’s a 
lot o’ truck aroun’ ’t I’ve kep’ handy to cook with when I 
happened to want to stop here over night, or sech a mat- 
ter ; ’n’ they’s wood in the woodshed yit, if I ’member 
right.” 

Maria opened the woodshed door in order to satisfy 
herself with her own eyes. 

“ Yes,” she cried, “ they is wood there, a lot o’ it, ’n’ all 
split, too ! W’y, they’s everything ! ’N’ here’s a shovel to 
take up the ashes with — ma, did ye ever see the beat ? 
’N’ a saw-hoss ’n ’a axe, ’n’ — ’n’ everything ! Lor ’ ! won’t 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


85 

we have a kick-up here all by ourselves 1 W’y it’s royal, 
that's what ’tis — a elegant sufficiency o’ everything ? I'd 
ruther be here hi with the angel Gabriel this minute ! ” 
And she commenced opening the stove-doors one after 
another. 

“ I’m glad ye like it,” Billy ventured to say. 

“Yes, we like it,” said Mrs. Pugsley with condescen- 
sion. “ It’s what we was used to afore misfortshun over- 
took us. We wa n’t alius common scrubs like what ye see 
now. ” 

“ I’m sure nobody ’d take ye fer common scrubs,” re- 
turned Billy, “/wouldn’t, least o’ all.” 

The moist woman drew a blanket around her, in a royal, 
all-presupposing manner, and then sank back as if to a 
slow and poisonous decay. “ This is suthin’ like bein’ 
a Swipes,” she remarked again, and she closed her eyes. 

“ Dad,” said Maria with an air of bland authority, “ye 
mus’ go right out now ’n’ git a chunk o’ bacon somers ’n’ 
lemme try this ’ere stove. Lor’, I ain’t had holt o’ a stove 
afore fer a age ’n’ a half. I wonder if I’ll know how to 
act with it. Is this ’ere jigger in the pipe a damper ? ’N’ 

how does it go ? Oh, yes, I see now. Run, dad, ’n’ git 
the bacon. I’m jes’ cavin’ in with hunger, ’n’ the sight 
o’ a stove puts me clean on the rampage. Ye’ve got six 
bits left, hain’t ye ? That’ll buy ’nough fer two or three 
days. We’ve got some coffee yit — run out to the wagin 
’n’ git it, Maud Eliza — run ! ” 

Maud Eliza tittered and skipped wildly out of the room 
and down the path, kicking up her skirts very high be- 
hind. 

“We’d better set the fire a-gointhe fust thing, I reckon,” 
said Billy, “’n’ then I’ll go after the grub. I know where 
to git it, ’n’ yer dad might have to hunt fer the place ! ” 

“ He’d find it soon ’nough -if they kep’ it at the saloons,” 
said Maria. “But do jes’ ’s ye like. I’ll go split some 


86 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


kindlin’ while ye’re away ’n’ set the fire a-goin. . Lor’, 
what times ! ” 

She went out into the woodshed, and, instead of starting 
at once for the victuals, Billy followed her as devoutly as 
a young enthusiast follows a heavenly vision. When he 
reached the doorway she already had a stick in position 
and was raising the axe for a blow. 

“ Wait — wait ! ” he called to her, eagerly. 

She stopped and looked at him smilingly, with the axe 
poised in mid-air. 

“Wait ? ” she called out to him interrogatively. “What 
fer ?” 

“ Why, / want to split the kindlin’ ! ” 

“ What fer ? ” she repeated, still smiling and with the 
axe still poised. He thought he had never seen anything 
so beautiful as she was just then, with her strong, firm 
figure thrown into that alert attitude and her muscular 
arms holding the axe as if it were no more than a 
feather’s weight Her lips were parted, so that her white 
teeth shone through, and her eyes were shining like pre- 
cious stones. 

As he did not answer, she lowered the axe so that the 
iron head rested upon the foot with which she was hold- 
ing the stick in place on the ground ; then she crossed 
her hands on the top of the helve, still looking at him. 
When she spoke again the laughter had died out of her 
face somewhat. 

“What d’ ye want to split the kindlin’ fer? ” she asked 
again. 

She seemed so self-controlled, so sure of herself and 
her future, so capable of turning all things into whatsoever 
direction she would, while he was certain only that he 
loved her and longed to serve her. 

“ W’y,” he began stammeringly, “I reckon ’t bein’ a 
man it ’ud be properer fer me to do it.” 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA 1 I. 87 

She laughed and let the axe fall from her hands to the 
ground. 

“ I’m sech a dellycut thing, ain’t I,” she cried, moving 
back against the wall and standing with her arms akimbo. 
“Well, ye can split the kindlin’ if ye like ’n’ I’ll stan’ ’ere 
’n’ look on ’n’ play the lady.” 

Billy came forward and picked up the axe. It was 
probably his bending posture that caused him to flush so 
hotly, as he said : 

“Bein’alady ain’t no play with you, I’ll go bail. If 
they ever was a lady anywheres, it’s you, ’n’ so I tell ye, 
right now ! ” 

Maria laughed. 

“Oh, I mean it, ’’declared Billy, giving the stick of kind- 
ling a random blow that caused the dry dirt to fly in all 
directions and rattle against the walls, “I mean it, every 
word ; ’n’ I’d like to ketch the feller ’t dares deny it ! ” 

“It wouldn’t be no great ketch, I reckon,” declared 
Maria. “Lor, there’s MaudElizy with the coffee, ” she add- 
ed as that hilarious damsel made her appearance, titter- 
ing, in the woodshed door. “Did ye have to hunt all 
over the waggin afore ye found it ? ’n’ how much is they 
o’ it? ’ Nough fer two-three drawin’s yit, ain’t they !” 
She reached out her hand for the package, opened it and 
looked in. “Oh, yes, they’ll be ’nough to last till day 
after to-morrer if we’re savin’ ; ’n’ mebbe dad ’ll get work 
by that time, so ’t’ we needn’t scrimp no more.” 

“Ye never’d guess where I found it,” said Maud Eliza, 
snorting at some comical recollection which went through 
and through her and doubled her up into her apron. 

“Well, where?’’ asked Maria, willing to be amused. 

“Guess ! ” cried the giggler, grasping her side and keep- 
ing her head concealed in her apron. 

“No, I never could guess nothin’. Mebbe Mr. Bling ’ll 
try.” 


88 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


“ I never could guess nothin’, nother,” declared Billy, 
pausing in his task very willingly to declare his similarity 
to Maria even in the insignificant particular of guessing. 
“I never could guess the fust blame thing ! ” 

The giggler withdrew her head from her apron and 
kicked one foot playfully toward the young man over the 
threshold while she still clutched her apron in both hands. 

“ Well, I’ll tell ye, then,” she snickered. “ It was wrap- 
ped up in one o’ my ole shoes ! ” With that she “let go ” 
of herself somewhere with a violence that sent her spin- 
ning into the front room where she tumbled upon an empty 
candle-box under the window in a spasm of fearful snorts. 

Maria smiled a little, too. 

“ ’T won’t hurt the coffe none,” she said, philosophi- 
cally. “ They was a paper ’round it. Lor ! ye’ve got ’nough 
kindlin’ wood to last a plump week. Now, let’s see what 
the stove’s like. D’ye reckin it ’ll draw ? We used to have 
a stove to Navady City ’t smoked us to herrin’ s every time 
we cooked on it. I hope this ’un ain’t like that. 

“No, I ’m sure this ’un ain’t like that,” said Billy, gather- 
ing up an armful of kindling and following her into the 
front room. “They ain’t been no fire in it fer some time 
now, but I reckon it ’ll go. ” 

Maria knelt down by the hearth and he deposited the 
kindling in a heap at her side. She took up two or three 
sticks in a thoughtful way and turned them over and over 
in her hands. 

“I ’m ’feard they won’t light ’less they been whittled a 
little,” she said. “Gimme yer knife a minute, will ye? 
D’ ye ever see a wooman whittle? ” 

“D’ know ’s I did,” he answered, drawing out his knife 
and unclasping it, “’n I d’ knows I want to. I ’ll whittle 
the kindlin’s. That’s man”s work, too.” 

“Oh, pshaw !” said Maria. “I reckon wimmin’s good 
fer suthin ! ” 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA II. 


89 

“Oh, yes wimmin’s good fer suthin,” assented Billy, 
cheerfully. And then with a rush, “I wouldn’t object if 
ye said one o’ ’em was good fer everything ! 

Maria took the whittled sticks from him as fast as they 
were ready and laid them in a loose pile inside the stove. 
Once she looked up at him with sudden gratitude and said 
impulsively : 

“ Ye ’re very good to us — all o’ us. I hope ye won’t 
never regret it — d’ye reckin ye will ? ” He looked at her 
with a stress of emotion which made him afraid to speak 
— with a magnetic tingling of nerve that came of a height- 
ened sense of comprehension and sympathy. He wished 
he dared touch her — dared tell her all that was in his heart, 
then and there. But that was impossible. Mrs. Pugsley 
and Maud Eliza were both in the room, the former obliv- 
ious to everything, even the slow process by which she 
seemed changing into an unwholesome vapor. He glanc- 
ed around to see what Maud Eliza was doing. She was 
sitting on the candle-box by the window, her back toward 
Jiim, and she seemed to be picking holes in the window- 
ledge with the point of a pin. Just then Maria scratched 
a match under his nose and leaned forward to apply it 
to the shavings ; for a moment their faces were close to- 
gether and when she lifted her head a stray lock of hair 
brushed his cheek. Her face was in the opposite direction 
and before he knew what he had done, he had turned and 
kissed that fluttering tress of hair ! And she did not know 
— how could she ! He was ashamed of himself a moment 
later for taking advantage of her so, but for his life he could 
not have helped it. No man is always master of himself 
in the presence of the woman he loves, and Billy’s soul had 
obeyed that sudden impulse of tenderness as promptly as 
his muscles ordinarily obeyed his will. When Maria turn- 
ed from the stove again she wondered why Billy was blow- 


9 o 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVLLAH. 


ing so hard at the blaze which was leaping up brightly as 
if disclaiming the need of his eager assistance. 

As soon as Billy dared look up he glanced back once more 
at Maud Eliza to see if she had noticed anything ; but she 
was still sitting with her back toward him, picking some 
sort of pattern in the window-ledge with the point of her 
pin. He heaved a sigh of relief. He felt guilty enough 
to endure any sort of punishment — that is any sort of pun- 
ishment short of Maria’s anger at his audacity — but he was 
glad that no one suspected him and that there was no pros- 
pect of his getting his just deserts. 



IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH 


91 


CHAPTER XI. 

When the fire was well started Maria rose from her 
knees, as impatient of the delay before getting dinner as a 
fashionable woman who is obliged to postpone a shop- 
ping expedition for a quarter of an hour. 

“It seems a thousan’ years till I can git to cookin’ on 
that air stove,” she said, regarding that article of furniture 
with affectionate ownership. “I’d ruther have it ’n’ a 
cart load o’ that jewl’ry like what the women in ’Frisco 
load theirselves down with. It makes a body feel sort o’ 
lifted up ’n’ airy to git a house ’n’ furniter ’n’ all this truck 
to wunst. I feel like I was bein’ fooled, somehow, ’n’ ’t 
can’t be true.” 

“Well, I’ll strike outfer the grub now,” said Billy, mak- 
ing for the door. “I reckon ye all feel ruther holler after 
the trip ye’ve had ’n’ can git aroun’ a reasonable pile. 
Mind,” he added, turning on the threshold and laughing 
back at Maria, “’n’ don’t wake up ’fore I come back, fer 
that ’ud prove it’s all a dream ! ” 

“ No fear but what I’ll stay asleep ’s long’s I can if this 
is dreamin’,” answered Maria. “I ain’t the one to let a 
soft snap go afore I have to, ye can bet on that ! ” 

Half-way down the path he called back again : 

“ Tell yer ma,” he said, “’t I’m a-goin’ to git ’er the 
best lot o’ ham sandwitchers in Havilah, with a layer o’ 
ham ’n’ mustard into ’em ’s thick ’s ’er foot ! ” And then, 
seeing the look of approval on Maria’s face, he shut the 
gate with an inconsequent bang and in a moment was out 
of sight 

“ He’s a reel nice feller, anyhow,” said Maria, turning 


92 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH 


back into the room. “A reel nice feller. Id’ know ’s 1 
ever seen one afore where the goodness seemed to go 
clean through ’n’ through ’n’ stick out the way it does 
with him. ,> 

And Ephraim, freed from the responsibility of provis- 
ioning the establishment, sat down in the woodshed door 
and chuckled in a knowing way. It was a theory of his 
that when a girl begins to call a young man a nice fellow 
she must be ‘ ‘ pretty f^r gone. J ’ 

“Oh, I reckon they’s folks ’t ’ud call ’im a nice feller,” 
remarked Maud Eliza in a judicial manner that implied 
mental reservations in this particular case, though she 
thought best to speak in general terms. 

“’N’ they’s fools in the world ’t don’t know a decent 
man when they lay eyes on ’im,” said Maria, mimicking 
her sister’s tone. 

“ ’N’ they’s folks in this world ’t’s nothin’ but fools when 
they think they’re awful smart,” retorted Maud Eliza, 
spurred into unusual mental activity by the consciousness 
that the red-headed stranger had paid very little attention 
to her. “They’s fools in this world ’t thinks they’re awful 
smart,” she added, cuttingly. 

“Well, don’t quar’l” quavered Mrs. Pugsley from her 
blankets, undertaking the part of peacemaker with her 
dreary formula. “ The world’s wide’nough to get along 
in ’thout quar’lin’.” 

“Some folks thinks red hair is purty,”said Maud Eliza, 
flashing a glance of defiance at her sister, and descending 
with scornful dignity from the general to the particular. 
“ ’N’ some folks thinks scrubby red moustaches is hansim 
’n' genteel ; but they’s others in this world ’t wouldn’t look 
at ’em — thank the Lord ! ” 

“ Well — well ! ” put in Ephraim in his tone of reconcilia- 
tion. 

“They’s folks in this world ’t thinks dif rent,” added 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


93 

Maud Eliza. “ They’s folks ’t has better tastes, thank the 
Lord ! ” • 

“ If she keeps ’er mouth a-goin’ ’bout Billy Bling at that 
rate,” declared Maria with the fire in her eye, “ she’ll git 
it slapped all over ’er face, fust thing she knows. Ye 
orter be ’shamed, after all he’s done fer us. If I hadn’t no 
more sense o’ gratitude, I’d set down ’n’ eat my ears ! ” 

But Maud Eliza, far from feeling remorseful, sniffed 
disdainfully and commenced picking the window-sill with 
her pin once more. However, she was careful not to 
say anything further about red hair and scrubby mous- 
taches after Maria’s very definite threat about slapping. 

Billy hurried away, blissfully ignorant of Maria’s 
championship of him : perhaps he could not have been 
happier had he known. He was too glad even to want 
to sing — a mode of expression which he had hitherto 
found adequate to the exigencies of any sort of hilarity ; 
he did not want to make any kind of noise ; he wanted 
to let the thought of Maria fill him undisturbed by anything 
— he wanted to hurry on and do something for her and exult 
in the power to be of use to her. It seemed to him a wonder- 
ful thing that the people about the camp could not guess his 
errand — he knew they could not, though the world seemed 
so full of it ; he could pass them face to face without one of 
them suspecting that he was high in the favor of the love- 
liest woman in all the world — thaft possibly he was making 
her love him for the service he was rendering her. He was 
glad people could not guess it — he wanted to be alone 
with his hopes and dreams. There would be time enough 
to enjoy the envy and congratulations of people here- 
after. 

Billy’s regard for women had always been as widely 
removed as possible from love and passion ; it had 
amounted to a tender reverence for them as the purest 
and best of God’s creatures. He had memories of better 


94 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


days than these he had passed in California — memories 
which came back to him fitfully with sweet messages, 
like winds breathing from a distance. The remembrance 
of his dead mother’s love often recurred to him with a 
pang that was half-pleasant and made him long, in a help- 
less, desolate way, for a renewal of her caressing tender- 
ness. He never in his thoughts classed the women of 
Havilah even generically with that dead mother, who 
had become to him the type of all true womanhood ; they 
were monsters, a cross between brute and human, center- 
ing in themselves the worst qualities of each. But he 
could reconcile Maria with the image of his mother. He 
was sure she was kind of heart and would be a faithful, 
loving wife to the man who was fortunate enough to win 
her. He could imagine her in her maturity still more like 
the mother he had lost — kind and considerate, earnest 
and affectionate, — a softened image of her present con- 
tradictory self. His love for her was a growth so sudden 
as to produce some confusion in his thoughts, but he was 
very certain that she was the only woman in the world 
he could ever care for. He wondered, with a delicious 
sense of present enjoyment, ho\v it was that he had never 
missed her in all these years when all at once she seemed 
so essentially a part of him. Possibly the time had been 
a preparation. At any rate, he was quite ready for her. 
He seemed to have been waiting for her without know- 
ing it. That was why he recognized her so quickly and 
felt the need of her all in a moment. It does not take 
any man long to fall in love who has never had occasion 
to entrench himself in single blessedness by the cheerful 
recollection that Adam’s was a helpmeet to evil ; and this 
was especially true of Billy who, in matters of the heart, 
was utterly without experience and had formed but few 
opinions from observation. He. was perfectly convinced 
that Maria was good ; he felt as if he had known her and 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


95 


had seen into her heart since the beginning of time. He 
could not understand Maria at once in all her preferences, 
but in a general way she was quite plain — a known island 
in the waste ocean of his ignorance of femininity. She ex- 
plained herself in that mysterious thrill of sympathy which 
supplies the place of many reasons where love is deep 
and unselfish. 

Billy did not have to go very far for the provisions, but 
it was far enough to give him all the time he needed to 
think of Maria. How different she was from these 
characterless, unwholesome women of Havilah — from her 
own gaseous mother and weak-minded sister, from all 
the women in the world, for that matter ! She was the 
prototype of his conception of a perfect woman, honest, 
independent and affectionate. He returned to the cabin, 
smiling even more broadly than when he left it, and de- 
posited his heap of provisions on the table. Maria came 
to his side at once and commenced untying the parcels. 

“ Lor’, if there ain’t the sandwitchers fin’ly V at last ! ” 
she cried in delight, carrying the package to her mother, 
and placing it at the moist woman’s side on the blanket. 
“ Jes’ look at ’em, now, ma ! Don’t them look good ? 
Ain’t them darlin’s ? ’N’ look at the mustard — ’d ye ever 

see it spread ’s thick in all yer life ’fore ? If them ain’t 
immense eatin’, now, ye may call me a buzzard ! ” 

Mrs. Pugsley seemed to have recurred by intuition to 
the ancient theory of Protagoras, that on. every subject 
contrary affirmations may be maintained. 

“ I’ve alius said as too much mustard ain’t good ferthe 
lungs ’n’ liver,” she declared, drawing the sandwiches 
toward her with a sort of protesting acquiescence. Then, 
in her deposed empress tones : “ Not ’tl have any call to 
complain, ’n’ not ’t I’m complainin’, but I’d like fer folks 
to know what they’re givin’ me V how it ’ll prob’ly act 
on my insides.” 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


96 

“ Oh, it won’t hurt ye,” encouraged Maria. 

Mrs. Pugsley waved her moist hand with the air of a 
mother disowning her daughter on the stage. 

“ Ye never was half a Swipes, nohow,” she said. 
“ Not but what ye’re good to me, ’n’ all that; but it’s 
like they was suthin’ atween us ’t won’t let ye onder- 
stan’. ” 

She shook her head sadly and transferred her reproach- 
ful gaze to the sandwiches. 

“ Not ’t I have any call to think ’t anybody keers ’bout 
the state o’ my lungs ’n’ liver ’nough to hender me from 
swollerin’ what ’s likely to hurt ’em,” she said, returning 
to a physiological contemplation of thesubject. “’T ain’t 
that. The sooner my lungs ’n’ liver is gone ’n’ is no 
more, the better it’ll be fer all ; ’n’ mebbe that’s the idee 
ye have in mind in forcin’ ’em down me. I’ll eat the sand- 
witchers ’n’ joyful, Mr. Bling, hopin’ they ’ll red the world 
o’ me.” She wiped her eyes on her sleeve and then lay 
back among the blankets and fell to eating. 

Maria set about getting dinner at once. The stove was 
an increasing wonder to her. She found it a difficult feat 
to lift the stove-lids on the lifter without letting them fall ; 
the blaze shining through the draught in front delighted 
her ; the roar in the pipe was music, and the damper had 
to be adjusted continually to regulate the blaze exactly to 
her liking. That stove suggested unlimited culinary expe- 
riences ; it involved ever widening relations, ever new 
combinations, like the uses of scientific study. She felt 
as if it were destined to draw out all her latent capabilities 
— as if she were becoming educated by existing in its prox- 
imity. 

“ I reckon stoves is common ’nough,” she remarked, 
poking the ashes away from the draught in front, “ but 
we’ve had to bile our kittle over a out-door fire ’most ever 
sence I can ’member. Ain’t it neat, though, to see hoW 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


97 

the smoke all goes up the pipe V not even a whiff into a 
feller’s eyes ? I’d no idee a stove was so handy.” 

“Ye ain’t opened all the packages yit,” said Billy. 

“ Why, sure ’nough,” answered the girl. “ Seems like 
when ma gits suthin’ ’t she likes, the rest o’ us orter be 
'satisfied ; ’n’ that stove is a dumplin’, ’n’ no mistake.” 
She cast a backward admiring glance at it as she moved 
toward the table. “ I could set by the hour and watch 
it.” 

“Weill” said Maud Eliza, somewhat sharply, “ye 
may set by the hour an watch it if ye like when dinner ’s 
over, but jes’ now I want to say my insides is howlin’ fer 
grub ! ” 

“Well,” said Maria, good-naturedly, “we’ll see what 
we’ve got, then ! Lor ! a chunk o’ bacon ’t smells like it 
had been dropped straight from Paradise. That makes 
my stummick begin to talk, too. ’N’ here’s some crack- 
ers ’n’ coffee ; ’n’ what’s this ? Butter ? Good Lord 1 
Look at that, ma ! Butter to eat onto our crackers, ’stid 
o’ bacon gravy ! We ain’t had no butter fer months 
afore, ’n’ I vow I’d ’most fergot what ’twas like. Yes, 
’n’ pertaters ; ’n’ ’ere’s a can o’ peaches — them San Jose 
kind, ’t melt in yer mouth ’n’ slip down afore ye want ’em 
to. Well, well ! ” She stepped back and regarded Billy 
with a smile of cordial thanks. “ Won’t we have a sure- 
’nough feast now ? ’N’ all o’ yer gettin’, too ! Mebbe 

we’ll have a chance to do suthin’ friendly fer you some 
day, ’n’ we won’t fergit this when our time comes ! ” 

It was not a conventional scene between lovers, but it 
was a moment of peculiar sweetness to Billy. The pure 
spontaneity of her gratitude refreshed him, but he could 
not help feeling embarrassed by the thought that it was 
necessary for her to be grateful to him for anything. He 
wondered if she was not a little embarrassed, too ; she 
$id not seem so, but he had heard that women were able 

7 


9 8 /iV THE VALLE V OF HA VILAH. 

to hide such emotions. He did not like the thought that 
she might feel under obligations to him ; there is always 
an element of discomfort in such a relation. He could 
not meet her eyes as he would like to have done. To 
cover his confusion he turned away and commenced 
fumbling among the contents of a little deal cupboard 
against the wall. Presently he produced a skillet from 
this hiding-place and set it on the stove-hearth. 

“It’ll want dustin’ out a little, I reckon,” he said. “It 
ain’t been used for ever so long. It’s what I had to cook 
bacon in when I lived ’ere by myself. I ain’t used it 
more ’n two or three times sence I moved up in the hills, 
when I happened to be stayin’ in camp off ’n’ on. They’s 
fat ’nough in the bacon to cook itself, ain’t they? I 
thought I picked out a piece ’t was fat ’nough fer that.” 

“Oh, yes,” answered Maria. “They’s fat ’nough — 
plenty, plenty! Don’t it slice off beautiful? ’N’ ain’t 
them streaks o’ lean in it good fer sore eyes ? D’ye ever 
hear how the Mexicans feed their pigs every other day, 
so ’s to make fust a streak o’ fat ’n’ then a streak o’ lean ? 
Lor’, what a feast it is, to be sure ! ” 

“I wish ’t we had some flour to roll the slices in, don’t 
you ? I alius like bacon best ’t ’s rolled in flour afore it's 
fried. It makes it tenderer.” 

“I do’ know ’s I ever et it that way,” answered the 
girl. “I never heerd o’ it. ’N’ we ain’t got no flour, 
nohow.” 

“No flour, nuther?” echoed Billy. “Why, what ye 
been livin’ on ? ” 

“Nothin’, mos’ly,” was the grim answer. “ Oh, we’re 
capable o’ that,” she added, lifting her eyes to his face as 
the assurance of his pity dawned upon her mind. “We’re 
used to it.” 

“ Well,” said Billy with decision, “all I got to say is, 
ye ortn’t to be used to it, ’n’ I’m goin’ to fetch a sack o’ 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


99 

flour aroun’ this very afternoon, or have one sent. A 
feller must eat if he’s goin’ to live. It won’t matter if we 
don’t have none fer the bacon this time. Bacon ’s good 
anyhow ye fix it, ain’t it, now? I swear,” he added, 
with a laugh into which a note of dissatisfaction crept in 
spite of him as he thought of their forlorn condition, “ye 
folks was purty well cleaned out o’ eatin’ utensils.” 

“Yes, we was purty well cleaned out o’ eatin’ uten- 
sils,” she replied, without hesitation. “We’ve been short 
fer a week now, ’n’ the Lord only knows how we’d 
a-come out o’ it if ye hadn’t run onto us in that onex- 
pected way. If ye’ll send us the flour I’ll see to it that . 
it’s paid back when dad gits to work.” 

“Oh, that’s all right,” answered Billy, indifferently. 

Maria deposited the thin slices of fat in the skillet, and 
then turned to her mother, who was eating sandwiches 
after the manner of the sailor’s wife who had chestnuts in 
her lap, “and munched, and munched, and munched.” 

“Ye feel better now,” said the girl, measuring some 
coffee in her hand and throwing it into the simmering 
pot. “Ye look like ye’d took a new lease o’ life a’ready. 
No more feelin’ like a dead hoss dragged over a mountain 
trail, ma ! No more groanin’ ’n’ sighin’, eh, ma? La! 
only think, a good dry ruff ’n’ three hull rooms to our- 
selves — why, it’s princely, that’s what ’tis ! Run out into 
the woodshed, quick, Maud Elizy,’n’ fetch ’nother armful o’ 
wood ! Lor’, what changes they is in life ! Only think 
o’ this ’n’ then how we was fixed this mornin’ ! ” 

“Yes, it’s princely,” replied Mrs. Pugsley, with . a 
dreary shake of her head and the conscious look, of one 
who is descending to an untimely grave. “I know it’s 
princely, ’n’ ain’t I proud ’n’ grateful ’n’ happy ? But why 
couldn’t it a-come sooner? The Lord don’t treat me 
right, nohow ; He ain’t fair — He never was. But I 
don’t complain. It’s more like the Swipeses ’n what I 


too IN THE VALLEY OF HAVlLAH. 

eVer ’spected to be agin. I don’t complain.” And she 
groaned. 

“Oh, ye’ll be all right to-morrer,” said Maria, cheer- 
fully. “Only think o’ sleepin’ under a dry ruff wunst 
more — why it’s like ole times up to Nevady City, ’n’ ye 
alius said that was ’zackly like the Swipses. Don’t that 
bacon smell good, though ? M-m-my ! ” 

Mrs. Pugsley finished her third sandwich and stretched 
herself out on her blankets, looking very weak and 
watery. 

“Well, I swear!” cried Billy, suddenly, springing to- 
ward the door. “If there ain’t Jim Hulse after his 
hosses ! Ain’t I a good ’un to fergit ’em like that ? He 
must a-had to foller me all aroun’ the camp to find ’em. 
’Fore Jack, Pm ruther ’shamed o’ that ! v 

“Oh, I reckon it won’t hurt yer Jim Hulse to stretch 
his legs a little,” answered Maria, carelessly, not looking 
up from the sputtering bacon which she was poking with 
a fork. 

Billy* heard her, but did not wait to answer. He strode 
rapidly toward the gate, where a man stood as if expect- 
ing him. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


IOI 


CHAPTER XII. 

Maria came to the door in an interval of her cooking to 
get a breath of air and a glimpse of the man who “read 
books ” and had the reputation of a quondam murderer. 

“He ain’t a bit hansim,” was her first thought. And 
then, “I wonder what he could reely a-done. He looks 
like he hated hisself ’n’ everybody.” 

She could not take her eyes off him. 

“Whatever he’s done,” she thought, with an inward 
thrill, like the flutter of wings in a lone thicket, “he’s 
sorry fer it now. Nobody could have that look ’n’ not 
be repentant. He don’t look ezackly good, but he looks 
lonesome V — ’n’ wonderful.” 

She almost wished, with a little rush of warmth through 
her heart, that she knew him and could befriend him and 
make him forget how lonesome the world was. For he 
seemed lost in this big, bare landscape — lost and helpless 
and sorrowful. And then she fell to wondering what in 
the world she could find to say if by chance she were 
obliged to speak to him. She couldn’t imagine anything 
he would care to hear her talk about. He seemed such 
a poor listener when Billy talked. But, of course, Billy 
was not very interesting. 

“I reckon I better keep away from ’im,” she thought, 
and the warm feeling died out and left a queer little chill 
in its place. “They ain’t no tellin’ what he might do if 
he was stirred up.” 

Presently the horses were unharnessed, and Hulse 
turned and spoke in a low tone to Billy. Maria could 
not hear what he said, but she noticed his unintentional 


102 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


tone of patronage, which somehow seemed just, and not 
to be resented. The tone was not unfriendly ; it was 
supremely indifferent, yet pervaded by the indescribable 
accent of one who speaks across a social gulf. Billy did 
not notice — perhaps he tacitly admitted the other s superi- 
ority. 

“He is a queer man,” she said, interested and awed. 
“What could he a-done, I wonder? ” 

In her unusual concentration of thought she had 
spoken aloud, and the sound of her own voice startled 
her. It startled Maud Eliza, too, who was thrumming 
against the window-sill. 

“Seems like all the men’s queer in this country,” 
tittered the girl. “ I ain’t seen one yit ’t /’ d have.” 

“Oh, shet up !” cried Maria, with sudden irritation. 

Maud Eliza made up a face and commenced to sing 
provokingly to the accompaniment of her rapid tattoo on 
the window-ledge : 

“ Granny, will yer dog bite, dog bite, dog bite? 

Granny, will yer dog bite ? 

No, child, no ! ” 

But for a wonder Maria turned her back, resolved not 
to hear. She wanted to improve all the time while Hulse 
was there in trying to make him out. She wondered 
what there was in him that insisted itself on her so. 
Yes, she could imagine that he had murdered some one, 
she could even fancy the victim’s sensations while look- 
ing up into those burning eyes. 

While she mused thus in her rapid way, he suddenly 
raised his eyes and looked her full in the face. She 
could not meet his gaze — it cowed and frightened her, 
and she shrank back as if from a draught of stifling air. 
The eyes with the smothered fire in them rested on her 
only an instant — indeed, she was not sure that he saw 
her at all. He seemed to look through and beyond her 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


I03 

at something afar off ; it was a look so intent and wide- 
reaching, so regardless of adjacent objects that she felt a 
desire to turn and discover the object which had so fixed 
his regard. But all at once he turned his back on her 
and said something in a low tone to Billy. 

In another moment he mounted one of the horses, and 
then his face was toward her again. She was glad that 
Billy was not looking in her direction, and could not see 
the flush that leaped to her forehead and made her feel 
helpless and foolish. Hulse could not help noticing her 
this time, standing as she was in his direct line of vision 
— must observe that her dress was soiled and torn, that 
her hair was uncombed, her shoes down at heel, and, 
worse than all, that the hot blood was flaming in her 
face — a phenomenon which he would doubtless construe 
into a shamefaced confession of untidiness — possibly into 
an admission of fear of his censure. The thought an- 
gered her strangely ; she could not bear the idea that he 
should pass judgment on her in that lordly way. Billy 
might put up with such condescension if he chose, but 
she never would. What right had he to judge her ? Was 
not she her own mistress ? She would have none of his 
patronage and fine airs. His criticism was a menace to 
her independence; her strong self-love shrank from his 
mysterious interference as her healthy body shrank from 
the prospect of illness. 

In a sudden paroxysm of rage she entered the house 
and slammed the door behind her, to let him know once 
for all how much she cared for his opinion. She reck- 
oned she had a right to dress as she chose, for all of him, 
or not dress at all, if it suited her better. He hadn’t 
bought her clothes for her ; he had nothing to say about 
how often she should wash them. She longed to shout 
her derision and defiance of him, to stand somewhere in 
full view and say nasty things about his clothes, which. 


104 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


when all was said, were no cleaner nor better than her 
own. His overalls were all over mud at that minute, and 
she would like to tell him of it, only she could not picture 
him caring for such spitefulness from anybody, much less 
from her. He would sit there just as calm as ever and 
look superior and say nothing back. Well, then, she 
would say nothing, either; but she wished she had made 
her most hideous face at him before she slammed the 
door — the face she scared intrusive little boys with when 
they strayed too near the wagon. That face was Marias 
masterpiece. It was made by stretching her mouth as 
far as possible with her thumbs and drawing down her 
lower eyelids with her forefingers, till nothing but the 
red and white showed ; and to this fiendish appearance 
she added a deathly horror by grating her teeth together 
or running out her tongue and groaning. She wished 
she had done that to Hulse to express her contempt for 
him. 

While these thoughts flashed through her mind, she 
was moving toward the window, as if drawn by some 
power beyond herself, and now, with an anxiety which 
she would have scorned in another, she was peering out 
to discover how much Hulse was annoyed and discon- 
certed by her violent declaration of independence. She 
found him seated precisely as she had last seen him, with 
his eyes directed toward the doorway in that absent, 
vision-seeing manner, evidently unconscious of her having 
left the spot or having been there. Her anger had been 
all for nothing, then, — he had not even seen her ! Could 
it be possible ? — he had been looking directly toward her 
when she shut the door. And yet there could be no 
doubt about it — he had not seen her at all. She believed 
that he was capable of it, he was capable of an)dhing ; 
she was certain now that he had murdered cart-loads of 
men. She could have cried with vexation and rage. To 


IN THE VALLEY OE HAVILAH. 


105 

her the passive contempt of incoherence was hardly less 
bitter than the active contempt of criticism. 

It is a dark cavity that contains the human brain ; and 
perhaps that is why our good and evil impulses so often 
get mixed and huddled together in frightened groups of 
contradictions. Before resuming her cooking, Maria — all 
the time bitterly resentful of this stranger who had some- 
how interfered with her spiritual life — laced her shoes 
more carefully than she had done for a month before, 
and smoothed her hair a little ; then looking down at her 
dress, she resolved that before another day passed that 
garment should be washed, and ironed, and mended, if 
the deed was the last of her life. She wasn’t going to 
have people looking down on her if a little soap and 
water could prevent it — though where the soap was to 
come from was an unsolved mystery. 

And the next moment she wheeled around completely, 
vowing that she would daub herself from head to foot 
with dirt and grease and pass that Jim Hulse on the 
street, wagging her head and running out her tongue at 
him. Yes, that is what she would do. Who was he, 
she would like to know, that he should turn up his nose 
at her as if she was no better than the sidewalk for him to 
run over ? Was he any better than she ? At any rate, she 
hadn’t murdered cart-loads of men, women, and children. 

But, after all, he had not turned up his nose at her ; he 
had not even seen her. And she had been a fool to slam 
the door in his face ; he would not have cared even had 
he happened to notice. And just at this point a drop of 
fat from the frying bacon must have sputtered into Maria’s 
face, for sh£ wiped her eyes on her apron and rubbed 
them particularly hard. Could she have analyzed her 
feelings, she might have discovered that she was less 
angry with this enigmatic stranger than with herself for 
appearing before him in such shabby array. 


ic6 IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 

Billy stayed to dinner, and was as gay as possible, but 
his Appetite was not good. (Has the reader noticed the 
mysterious effect which love has on digestion ?) He en- 
joyed seeing the others eat, however, and cracked jokes 
in a way that was alarming. Mrs. Pugsley rose to the 
occasion by seeing the company seated around the table 
on empty candle boxes before taking her own place, her 
wildly regal manner suggesting a histrionic attempt at an 
Eastern empress collecting her troops. She ate heartily, 
in spite of her three formidable sandwiches, and evi- 
dently enjoyed her dinner, though she managed to im- 
press Billy with the idea that hearty eating was one 
phase of her polymorphous misery. 

Maria ate even less than Billy, and she seemed absent- 
minded, but the young man was not disturbed by that. 
At table she addressed him only once of her own accord, 
and that was to inquire whether Hulse — she called him 
“that Hulse” — objected to the use to which his horses 
had been put that morning. On being answered in the 
negative, she looked relieved, as if she had half expected 
the owner of the animals to entertain prejudices against 
the promiscuous transportation of unfortunate and slat- 
ternly females around the country. 

The fact was, she was not at all herself. A sense of 
shame oppressed her ; she kept trying to understand why 
she cared so much about what had happened. She had 
studied her own mind so little all her life long that an 
attempt at introspection at this late day met with opaque 
resistances as impassable as if she had been trying to 
pass, ghost-like, through an unopened door. 

She was glad when the meal was over, glad when her 
mother spread herself out on the blankets once more and 
prepared to go to sleep, glad when her father and Billy 
went out together to look around the yard. She would 
not let Maud Eliza do the dishes, though that hilarious 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


107 


damsel offered ; she wanted to do them herself. A bit of 
familiar work gave her, as it were, a grip on the reality 
of things. After the dishes were done she went out and 
sat down alone on the veranda steps, still thinking ; and 
before she knew it the cottonwoods, at which she was 
looking fixedly, had grown dim as spiders’ webs tangled 
in the air, the river had diminished to a dotted line and a 
dull sound, and she could not see the mountains at all ; 
and then with a start she became aware that her eyes 
were brimming over with tears. She wiped them away 
on her apron — she wondered what Hulse would think if 
he saw how soiled that apron was — and winked so fast 
and hard that the tears could, not come again ; and pres- 
ently it entered her mind that if she could have appeared 
at the door in a garnet cashmere dress and long gold ear- 
rings — in her fondest imaginings Maria had sometimes 
pictured herself in that garnet cashmere, with a silk panel 
of the same shade — h^r impressions of “that Hulse” 
would have been much pleasanter. Perhaps he would 
have looked at her approvingly and smiled ; but no, she 
could not imagine him smiling. But it would have been 
something to know that she had no reason to be ashamed 
of herself. 

The polite reader who has studied women and the doc- 
trines of Leibnitz may find in Maria a partial confirm- 
ation of the philosopher’s theory of 4 the sameness of 
indiscernibles. 


io8 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAV/LAH. 


CHAPTER XIII. 

The light of love draws many virtuous plants from the 
soil on which it falls. Hitherto Billy Bling had never 
experienced any longing for an ideal personal excellence, 
but all at once he wished with the earnestness of his 
whole soul that he were a better man and more worthy 
of the woman whom this day had brought into his life. 
Such dissatisfaction is an assurance of a changed future. 

It was late in the afternoon when he bade Maria good- 
bye on the porch, promising, in answer to her iterated 
invitation — for his departure roused her from her absent- 
mindedness and awakened in her a knowledge of what 
she owed to his kindness — that he would drop in often 
and be sociable. The idea of dropping in often and 
being sociable filled his mind with a series of homelike 
pictures of himself and her together in the front room of 
the little house, while the rest of the family were con- 
veniently disposed of in the vague background till their 
presence was required at table or some other family rite. 
He went around to one of the stores and ordered a new 
supply of groceries to be sent to the cabin next day — 
Maria had assured him that she had enough already to 
last a week, but no other possible attention presented 
itself to his mind — and then started for home. He 
passed up the gentle slope between the river and the 
foothills, smiling as he thought of all the pleasant things 
that had happened to him during the day. He was very 
glad that Hulse had wanted him to go for the horses — 
very glad he had been idle at the moment and able to go. 
How queer it was to think of what he would have missed 


TN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


109 

had he worked that day as usual ! Billy’s nature was 
essentially a poetical one, though he was unaware of the 
fact, and he liked to imagine the consequences attending 
actions which had never taken place. He could hardly 
imagine himself ignorant of Maria's coming, even if he 
had stayed at home. Something would have told him — 
some influence in the air would have announced it. 
And it was so queer — he could not recover from the 
wonder of it — that he had never thought of her before, 
never dreamed of her, never longed for her — never, before 
to-day. And yet more marvellous was the apparent con- 
tradiction that she did not seem a stranger to him, that 
her voice was familiar, that her face suggested a dim, 
haunting memory, as a gratified desire suggests the un- 
gratified longing. It was all strange, and beautiful, and 
unreal. 

After leaving the valley his path lay through the cool, 
still gulches. There it was almost dark ; the sun had 
sunk behind the high black walls, though out in the 
valley the day still shone. Here and there, far above 
him, bits of purple or saffron-colored rock thrilled warmly 
under the touch of a belated sunbeam, looking like points 
of flame above the encroaching shadows. The trail 
ascpnded for some time along the steep grade of a small 
stream — a stream whose lips seemed shaped only for 
laughter, like a healthy child’s. A sudden narrowing of 
the little canon, then a sharp turn to the left, brought him 
face to face with a waterfall leaping down a wall of 
white rocks and illuminated dazzlingly by a flash of sun- 
shine which streamed through a small lateral gorge 
facing the west. Seen from the gloom from which Billy 
approached, the high white waterfall, swaying and flut- 
tering among the shadows, looked like a restless, sheeted 
ghost. At a nearer view the apparition lost its ghostly 
- aspect, and the gleam op the white rocks and the waver- 


I IO TN THE VALLE Y OF HA VILAH. 

ing water changed to such a light as Eastern travellers 
say flashes from the wings of a flock of storks stirring 
and mounting upward among the sunbeams. Near the 
cabin stood an evergreen oak. The sunshine fell upon it 
also, so that the late-clinging waxen berries of the mistle- 
toe were still visible among its branches. The wind 
kissed the heavy leaves into slow motion and whispered 
all sorts of aerial secrets. Winds are the souls of dead 
poets ; they breathe upon us fully the music of distant 
worlds, which living poets catch and repeat brokenly. 

Billy neither saw nor heard anything. For all he 
noticed on the way to his cabin, he might as well have 
been transported to the spot in his sleep. He became 
conscious of the earth’s existence and his own after he 
had been standing for some time in front of the waterfall 
and gazing down toward the west. He had lived a long 
life of adventure since leaving the place ; events had 
been heaping upon him ; he had experienced everything 
that was worth experiencing in life. 

He saw things in new forms and combinations. It 
was like beginning life all over again, and how pleasant 
that was ! Was this the same grim old earth he had 
been plodding around on all these years — were these the 
old familiar, monotonous surroundings ? 

The sun was low on the mountain-tops ; like a tired 
king, oppressed with his own glory, he sank to rest on 
his high bed. Billy sat down under the oak and gazed 
out at the evening changes as if watching the sun set for 
the first time. The slant rays from behind a far-off peak 
radiated like a quiver of arrows on an Indian’s broad 
shoulder ; the west was a sea-green expanse of sky with 
a fringe of fire. Then the light faded — how soon it 
always fades ! The shadows are so eager to take its 
place. Suddenly a south wind stirred along the sky and 
the white star-lilies burst into blossom. So the night came, 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


II 


Billy gazed long, and yet he had something better to 
think of than the stars or. the sunset. Maria had laid her 
hand in his at parting. What was there to think of in all 
the world but that ? And she had smiled and asked him 
to come often. Was there a Paradise beyond such hap- 
piness ? He was delirious with hope ; he could think of 
nothing distinctly but Maria and the future. She had 
been in the world all these years and he had not known 
it. He repeated that idea constantly, foolishly — he sent 
his thoughts again and again over his little world of 
knowledge, trying vainly to find some analogy to this 
solemn, happy experience. Ah, that never-to-be-for- 
gotten day of youth, when love puts out to sea with 
sweet trust in favoring winds ! Storm and shipwreck 
may follow, but the day has been lived, and death itself 
can not obliterate it from God’s record of earthly happi- 
ness and good. 

Billy rose from his seat under the oak tree and paced up 
and down the path before his cabin door, adjusting him- 
self to this new-found ecstasy. Occasionally he paused 
to gaze up into the clear sky, to listen to the music of the 
pines and the waterfall, or watch the ripples at his feet as 
they cast up the white, drowned stars from their depths. 
Maria was come ! The winds repeated it, the waters sang 
it, the night was full of the thought. Nature, with whom 
Billy had lived face to face for years, was his friend and 
partook of his joy. He was sure the trees were glad with 
him, that the wind and water sympathized. How com- 
plete the world seemed, and yet how prophetic of some- 
thing better than mere completeness ! It was as if, while 
listening to sweet music, he were straining above and 
beyond it toward some faint, inarticulate melody full of 
a diviner meaning than the earthly, audible tones. 

His future took more definite shape, like a city viewed 
from a hill. In the thought of Maria, all good seemed 


1 12 


IN THE VALLEY OF II A VI L AH. 


possible. She was a reminder of his better, half-forgotten 
past ; she necessitated a renewal of the best part of him. 
A desire to be something better for her sake, — something 
that she could look upon with love and generous praise, 
overpowered him like a slow-swelling surge that bears all 
before it. The discords of his life melted away, absorbed 
like the noises of the street in a sudden full peal of church 
bells that summon the soul to prayer. He felt for the first 
time that it is a good thing to live, that life means some- 
thing more than breathing and working, or even playing ; 
that it means a daily renewal of kindly human deeds and 
affections, of living thoughts and acts of self-forgetfulness. 
A vision of the world, as seen through the medium of his 
own experience and observation, passed before him and 
filled him with compassion for his kind — a vision of human 
beings who crawl out of the dust, wallow in the dust a 
while, and then return to dust again ; of tear-white faces 
of men and women who struggle and strive and fail and 
fill the world with the discords of selfishness. How 
miserable to-night seemed all human lives except such as 
had found out the uses of earnest, unselfish love ! Some- 
thing of the real holiness of life, of God’s meaning in man, 
for the moment likened the poor miner to the seer. 

A little later, in the calmness of retrospection, Billy 
thought of his past with thankfulness that Maria knew 
nothing of it. True, she had probably seen nothing 
better in the lives of the men around her, but that fact 
neither signified that she had deserved such associates 
nor that she ought to continue in their company. She 
was good herself — her frank independence, her tenderness 
for her mother, her hearty, joyous laugh, like a boy’s, her 
very tyranny over her father, left him in no doubt about 
that, and in common justice she ought to associate with 
people as good as herself. Billy, like the average lover, 
was capable of attaching all abstract virtues to the con- 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


Ir 3 


crete being whom he loved, but he felt it in him to go 
farther and endeavor to make himself the practical equal 
of his ideal. He resolved hereafter to find amusement 
only in his work, and live altogether in the thought of 
her approbation. Her approbation would keep him in 
the straight way if anything could. 

Not that Billy had ever been a hardened outlaw or a 
leader of others into crooked ways. His sins had been 
the sins of compliance ; he would always rather partici- 
pate than plan. Besides, his conscience had never lost 
sight of him, and whenever his actions overreached the 
average wrong to which he had accustomed himself, he 
felt the pangs of remorse in so lively a manner that he 
was careful of his conduct for a long time after. But now, 
measured by the standard of what Maria’s lover ought to 
be, he recognized in himself a hardened sinner, unworthy 
to touch even the hem of her garment. She showed him 
his childhood side by side with his manhood and made 
him ashamed. 

When Billy came to California a helpless, untried boy, 
he did as the Californians did, not because he found any 
genuine pleasure therein, but because it was easier to con- 
form than protest. He smoked, he drank, he gambled, 
he laughed at the sayings and doings of the lewd women 
who dominated the mines ; and all this without forgetting 
his mother’s teachings, but only as a make-shift for the 
better things he intended to do when circumstances should 
allow him to be himself without incurring the incon- 
venience of ridicule. 

But that time never came. Each day was a repetition 
of yesterday. Example, to which his compliant nature 
was always disposed to yield, became the gauge of his 
actions ; his self-condemnatory moments grew rarer and 
rarer, until he wore into the common shape, and the de- 
tails of his experience became mere repetitions of the 


IN THE VALLEY OF H A VI L AIL 


114 

experience of the men he followed. He never thought oi 
a better condition of things for himself except in a worldly 
and material sense ; he saw nothing better in life than to 
work till Saturday night and then come into camp for his 
spree with the others. The devil had made friends with 
him and would not quit him, and as the old gentleman 
was, on the whole, rather agreeable, — at least more agree- 
able than he would have been as an adversary, — Billy did 
not try strenuously to shake him off. Compliance is so 
easy for easy people who dread rebuke ; they move read- 
ily in the oiled groove of circumstance, and make no 
noise in the world, discordant or otherwise. 

At last Billy turned away and sought his heap of blankets 
in the cabin. There he lay looking out of the little window 
at the clouds which lay vaguely against the moonlit sky 
and listening to the mysterious whisperings- of the night ; 
but his thoughts were down in the valley where Maria 
was. What an inspiration to accompany him into the 
land of dreams, the thought that she was not far off, that 
he could see her again to-morrow and next day and next 
day, week after week, perhaps for the rest of his life ! 
This was living indeed ! His love had blossomed in one 
supreme moment, covering the barrenness of his soul 
with a growth as fresh and sweet and wholesome as the 
first grass which sprang up at the direct command of God. 
And at last he fell asleep, with the water calling, calling, 
even in his dreams, like voices that speak brokenly but 
lovingly from a distance. 


TN THE VALLEY OF HA VIL AH. 


115 


CHAPTER XIV. 

All the next morning Billy kept conscientiously at 
work with pick and shovel, often singing in time to his 
rhythmic blows on the rock — singingnotso melodiously, 
perhaps, as the birds sing, and -yet with the very spirit of 
the birds, because the winter was over, it was mating- 
time, and the riot of inward happiness must find vent 
somehow, no matter if only the rocks and trees were 
there to listen. I fear he would not have worked at all 
that morning had he consulted his own inclinations; but 
he had a faint recollection that ladies* were not in the 
habit of receiving calls early in the day — a custom whose 
significance he could not fathom, but which he felt con- 
strained to observe, out of deference to prejudice and cus- 
tom ; and until such time as he could go to Maria, 
digging was as good as anything to pass away the time. 
Work was not work in the company of such thoughts as 
Billy had. He could hardly imagine himself disliking 
anything laborious hereafter ; Maria’s name was an all- 
potent spell for the transformation of unpleasant things ; 
in it he felt the power of ancient magicians to exorcise 
evil spirits, drive away storms and pestilence, ^ and cure 
all manner of diseases. 

At noon he set his pick and shovel behind the cabin 
door, swallowed some cold boiled beans — as to their 
quantity or quality he had not the faintest idea — washed 
them down with cold coffee, and proceeded to make his 
toilet. And a truly primitive toilet it was. First he went 
out to the pool beneath the waterfall, where, in the quiet, 
shallow margin, the blue water was dappled with clouds 


N THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


1 16 

and the rocks and trees were glassed as in a mirror; 
here he stripped himself and waded out under the foam- 
ing waterfall and stood there five minutes or more, enjoy- 
ing such a bath as the naiads of old might have envied ; 
then, all wet and shining and agitated by delicious 
shivers, he put on his clothes with the jubilant exhalation 
that “cold water is the life of a man/’ Next he reentered 
the' cabin and brushed his red hair carefully into what 
Californians call a “ cow-lick ” — a system of combing 
which in the mines is considered equivalent to a verbal 
declaration of social reform ; then he examined his dirty 
boots with a critical eye, shook his head doubtfully, then 
half determined to clean them, but finally concluded the 
operation would take too much time ; and, last of all, 
he donned a stupendous necktie that suggested mingled 
thunder and lightning and human gore, eyed himself 
complacently in his little cracked mirror, and started on 
his visit to Maria. 

He wondered how she would look at him, what her 
first words would be. Friendly, he hoped — nay, he was 
sure of so much. He felt already good friends with her, 
but — might not a fellow (Billy meant himself by the 
generic term) reasonably look for something more than 
mere friendliness in her glance ? He could not be sure 
of anything more than good fellowship yesterday, though 
once or twice he half believed there might be. One of 
Maria’s charms lay in the fact that a man couldn’t read 
her all at once ; the windings of her character had to be 
followed and studied ; and what could be more agreeable 
than the investigation of such phenomena? She was as 
full of meaning as the picture of an unfamiliar city, and 
though he could only guess at the ultimate leading of 
her by-ways and thoroughfares, he was more than satis- 
fied with her general plan. 

Maria met him at the door, handsome and smiling. 


IN THE VALLEY 01 HA VILA H. 


n 7 

She had such a wonderful way of being friendly, Billy 
thought. She shook hands with him cordially — more than 
cordially — she gave his hand an unmistakable squeeze. 
Billy liked that, and squeezed back very hard, hoping she 
would do it again ; but she didn’t. She drew her hand 
away with a little laugh, but somehow he understood 
that she was not offended at his squeezing back. Alto- 
gether Maria in the flesh was better, if possible, than the 
spiritual Maria who had kept him awake the night 
before. 

4 ‘We ain’t got no chairs yit,” she said in her healthy, 
hearty voice, placing a candle-box by the front window 
for him to sit on. “After dad gits to work we can have 
some, I hope. We ain’t had no chairs o’ our own fer 
years ’n’ years — how long ago was it ’t we had them 
painted chairs in the room back o’ the saloon in Nevady 
City, ma, — when dad run the Pug Dog, don’t ye ’mem- 
ber ? Lor’, it must a-been fourteen or fifteen year ago — 
I know I wa’n’t nothin’ but a little teeny kid. Whatever 
becomes o’ the time, I’m sure I can’t tell.” 

Billy sat down on the box by the window, as happy as 
a king on his throne. And yet, after that first overflow 
of confidence, he felt strangely silly and confused. He 
dared not look into Maria’s face lest she should see the 
gladness in his eyes and demand the cause of it. He 
wondered what she really thought of his squeezing her 
hand in that fashion — surely she couldn’t have forgotten 
such an event already, though he had to confess she 
looked mightily unconcerned. He wondered how he 
had dared to do it, even though she led him on — possibly 
it was a mistake after all, and he had only dreamed it. 
Anyway, he was sure he would never venture on such 
familiarity again ; she might resent it a second time, 
though she passed it over so smoothly the first. She 
ought to have boxed his cars — it would have served him 


IN THE VALLE Y OF HA VILAH. 


JlS 

right. Not that he was sorry for what he had done — on 
the contrary; only it was a bold thing to do with a girl 
like Maria. He looked confusedly out at the sky, where 
the scattered clouds lay light as pollen dust — at the river, 
where the shadows fell in the water scarcely darker than 
the sunshine. How bright everything was — how full of 
music ! He himself seemed floating on waves of slow 
melody. 

He did not dare to turn and look at Maria, but he felt 
the need of saying something, as people in a bashful 
mood always do. With his face still averted toward the 
river, he managed to begin : 

“Oh, ye’ll like it ’ere, I’m sure ! ” he said. 

He was so happy himself that it seemed as if every- 
body, especially Maria, must be likewise. She had an 
effect on him like a draught of delicious wine. 

“ Oh, I ain’t afeerd o’ that,” she answered. 

He managed to take his eyes from the river, but even 
yet he could not look at her. He glanced around the 
room in a furtive, exploratory way, and noticed that the 
floors had been scrubbed and the windows washed. 

Maria followed his glance and laughed. She under- 
stood his confusion, he was sure, and yet she never said 
a word to lessen it. But that is the way with women, 
Billy thought. They like to make a fellow uncomfortable 
just to show their power, and they may feel as friendly 
as possible toward him all the time. But the thought that 
he must be appearing awkward in her eyes filled him 
with the resolution to appear more off-hand and easy, no 
matter at what expense of will-power he had to accom- 
plish it. With commendable boldness he fixed his eyes 
on the wall about two feet above her head and managed 
to articulate : 

“Ye’ve been cleanin’ house ’n’ makin’ things com* 
f’table, I see.’’ 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


Il 9 

“Yes, a little,” she answered. She did not seem in- 
clined to help him at all. Cruel Maria ! 

The knowledge that she had left him to work out his 
own salvation filled him with a spasmodic energy. 

“Ye ain’t one o’ the sort to let the grass grow under 
yer feet,” he said, in a complimentary tone. 

“Yes, I stirred aroun’ a little this forenoon. The floor V 
winders ’d been callin’ fer water fer months. Things gen’- 
rally was ruther dirty. La, this is suthin’ like livin’, this is. 
Why, it’s lux’ry ! Don’t ye think the room looks better? ” 

After that the ice seemed broken, and Billy felt easier. 
He glanced around the room with smiling approval and 
laughed for very joy. It seemed so natural for Billy to 
laugh. Maria liked, to hear him, and so she laughed too, 
in sympathy ; and then they looked at each other rather 
consciously, and of course Billy blushed. But he was 
determined not to be bashful any more. Underneath 
Maria’s coquetry he perceived the warmth of a cordial 
reception, and that made him bold. 

“Well, I should say it does look better !” he cried. 
“ If I had a million dollars this minute, I’d lay every cent 
o’ it ye won’t be bothered with a red ant here all summer. ” 

“ Why ? ” asked Maria. 

“ They’ll fall down on sech a slick floor ’n’ break their 
necks, every mother’s son o’ ’em ! ” he said with enthu- 
siasm. Then he flushed and laughed, and Maria laughed 
with him again. 

“Now ,youl” she reproved him, shaking her head and 
lifting her face. “Ye’re alius flatterin’. Ye fergit ’t 
praise to the face is open disgrace.” 

“Then I’m disgraced forever, ’n’ proud o’ it!” cried 
Billy, with increasing boldness. “ 'N’ I ain’t a-goin’ to 
take back a word o’ what I said, ’hf I’m a-goin’ to add 
to it ’t ye’re a nat’ral-born housekeeper, M — m — Miss 
Mariar ! ” 


120 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


And then he stopped. He was afraid he ought to have 
called her Miss Pugsley. 

But she did not seem to notice. 

“ Much you know ’bout housekeeping ” she said, still 
shaking her head and smiling. “ ’N’ ’tain’t much ’t I 
know ’bout it, nuther, to tell the truth. But now ’t I’ve 
got a home o’ my own I intend to learn, ’n* ye’ll see 
wonders aroun’ the place ’ere if ye keep yer eye peeled. 
Ye mus’ come in often — every day — ’n’ see how I im- 
prove. ” 

Billy turned away his face to hide the new flush of 
pleasure he felt surge across it. An ancient god who felt 
himself the owner of a rich temple never was so divinely 
proud and happy as was Billy at that moment. 

“ Thankee, M — m — Miss Mariar,” he stammered. 

This time she noticed the hesitation and formality with 
which he pronounced her name. 

“ Oh, leave off the handle,” she said, easily. “I ain’t 
none o’ yer fine folks, ’n’ style don’t go on me. Call me 
jes’ plain Mariar.” 

Billy sank back in a state of beatitude, unable to utter 
a sound for very happiness. What a wonderful, off-hand 
way she had of doing things, to be sure ! What a com- 
fort it was to sit in the same room with her, feel her near 
presence, note her quick smiles, and know that she was 
not altogether. indifferent to his friendship! It was like 
the warmth of a blazing fire after a day in the snow and 
wind — nay, it was like something more rapturous than 
that — he could not tell what it was like. And what a 
stupendously wonderful thing a beautiful woman is, alto- 
gether 1 Billy had never noticed before what long, rich 
eyelashes some women have, what redness of lips, and 
cheeks, what brightness of eyes, and into what distracting 
little wavy lines some women’s hair arranges itself! And 
then that smooth curve of the cheek just where the ear 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


121 


begins and the throat ends ; the ears themselves, like the 
pretty pink shells he had seen in the curiosity shops in 
the city ; and the throat and chin — the sudden discovery 
of such multitudinous charms almost took his breath 
away. He felt like one who is in contact with unknown 
things ; he had never noticed that women were in any 
way like that. And there she sat, smiling demurely 
while he examined her, as if unconscious of everything. 
He wanted to reach out and touch her, to make sure that 
she was really there. 

He would have liked it better — granting that such a 
thing were possible — had she displayed some such signs 
of confusion as he was sure she had noticed in him, but 
he satisfied himself with the assurance that she was not 
the woman to fall in love at first sight ; she must have time 
and circumstance before she could come to it. All he 
could do at present was to be good friends with her, make 
her feel his love in silence, teach her to think of him and 
need his presence. Billy was capable of some selfish 
calculation even in the unselfishness of his love. He 
must keep the other men of Havilah away, and he could 
accomplish that best by being so kind to her that she 
would have no need of other friendship. If she could 
not love him at once fully, as he loved her, she could 
learn, if no other man interfered. Her friendship for 
him was a warrant that he could place himself near her 
and surround her with kindnesses. This was his way of 
fortifying the city and garrisoning it with soldiers. 

“ Ma didn’t want me to slick up at all,” said Maria 
presently, glancing at her mother who lay on the blankets 
with her eyes shut, but with the unmistakable look of an 
invalid who knows that the condition of her health is 
noted. “She said things was good 'nough as they was. 
But I reckon she’s better satisfied now ’t it’s all over, ain’t 
ye, ma ? ” 


122 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


Mrs. Pugsley did not unclose her eyes but drew her 
lank knees up to her chin. 

“ That bacon ’t we had fer dinner was too fat ’n’ no- 
body can change my mind o’ it,” she declared with more 
than her usual decision. “ I’ve alius stuck to it as fat 
meat o’ any kind ain’t good for the lungs.” 

“She’s tired, ma is — pore ole ma ! ” said Maria. 
“ She don’t git ’s much joy out o’ the new house ’s what 
I' do. But she’ll have a good chance, to rest now. We’ve 
all o’ us- been on the go long ’nough, the Lord know^ — • 
’n’ ma specially.” 

Billy never knew in talking to Mrs. Pugsley whether 
he ought to be melancholy or in high spirits — melancholy 
from sympathy or in high spirits with the hope of cheer- 
ing her up, so compromised the matter by trying to look 
both ways and succeeded in looking neither. 

“Maud Elizy’s som’ers aroun’. She went into the 
woodshed to change ’er shoes. Shall I call ’er ? ’’ asked 
Maria. 

“ Gh, I reckon ye needn’t bother ’er,” answered Billy 
with self-denial. “I ain’t a-goin’ to stay long.” 

Maria laughed. 

“I reckoned ye might want to see ’er, ” she said,, de- 
murely. 

And then Billy laughed sheepishly. 

“ I thought we was goin’ to be good friends ’n’ all that,’ 
she added after a moment. “ ’N’ here ye begin by sayin’ 
ye ain’t goin’ to stay long. That ain’t no way. ” 

4 * Then Pll take it back ’n’ say I’ve come to stay forever. ” 
‘ Oh, don’t ! ” cried Maria, flinging up her hands in 
mock horror. “I .never could stan’ that, I’m sure ! One 
man in the fam’ly ’s all I can go.” 

And then they both laughed again. 

“I d’ know where dad is,” she went on. “ Mebbe 
he’ll be in purty quick. I reckon he’s out som’ers tryin* 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VI L AIL 


12 3 


to sponge a drink off ’m some o' the saloons, like he’s 
been doin’ all his life. Oh, well ! I alius want ’im to 
have ’nough to keep ’im good-natured. He’s a terror 
when he runs short, V I have to watch ’im every minute 
to keep ’im from ’busin’ ma. When he gits suthin’ to do, 
we won’t have nothin’ more to ask fer, seems to me.” 

“Oh, he can git work easy enough. If he can’t do no 
better I’ll give ’im a job on my claim up the gulch, there. 
He can get good wages anywheres if he can dig.” 

Maria shook her head doubtfully. 

“ I don’t b’lieve he’ll dig,” she said. “ He never has, 
so fur. He alius calc’lates on packin’ or teamin’ where 
other folks has to do most o’ the liftin’. He’s a lazy ole 
cove, dad is. I never seen a porer imitation o’ a man.” 

“ He married a Swipes,” articulated Mrs. Pugsley, with 
her eyes still shut. “’ N’ all the Swipeses from Adam 
down was proud ’n’ scorned to work.” 

“It might a-been better fer ’em if they had worked,” 
declared Maria. It was the first time Billy ever heard 
her say anything in disapproval of her mother. “ ’Tain’t 
’s disgraceful to work ’s tis to starve or steal or — or go 
dirty. ” 

Mrs. Pugsley groaned and shook her head. She had 
regulated her life according to a contrary system of ethics. 


124 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH 


CHAPTER XV. 

“ Well, well,” said Billy in a confident tone, “prob’ly 
yer daddy’ll git suthin’ to suit ’im ’fore long. I’ll look 
aroun’ ’n’ see what I can do fer ’im. I’ve got friends ’ere 
’t may be useful.” 

Maria thanked him with a look. 

“ Dad’s slower ’n the wrath o’ heaven when work’s the 
talk,” she said. “ ’N’ it ’ud be jes’ like ’im to give ye 
mud if ye took pains to find suthin’ fer ’im, ’n’ say ’twas 
too hard fer his frame, or suthin’. That’s the kind o’ 
dandelion he is.” 

“Oh, I reckon he’ll come to time,” answered Billy. 
“They’s purty sure to be teamin’ o’ some sort. Have 
ye been out aroun’ the camp yit to look at things ? ” He 
asked the question with the sly intention of discovering 
whether she had met with the masculine admiration he 
was sure would be hers when she went abroad. “ ’Tain’t 
much o’ a place,” he added, to take off what seemed to 
him the wiry edge of his remark. 

Maria looked down at her dress. 

“ Lor’ ! ” she exclaimed. “ Been aroun’ the camp ? I 
should say not ! I never heerd tell o’ the likes o’ you 
men, to think a woman can clean house V gad the streets 
’n’ do forty-’leven other things to wunst ! What d’ ye 
reckon we’re made of, anyhow ? ” 

Billy wanted to. answer “sugar candy,” but did not 
dare. 

“ ’N’ while I had a fire I done a bakin’, too — the best 
bread ye ever flopped a lip over, if I do say it myself ’t 
made it — a-raisin’ up out o’ the pan till ye’d think it was 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


125 


goin’ through the ruff o’ the house ’n’ clean up to glory. 
Dye reckon ’t a woman ’t does all that in a forenoon ’s 
got time to go a-sailin’ up ’n’ down the streets ? Well ! ” 
she laughed, but there was a ring in her voice that made 
Billy look at her curiously. 

“ ’N’ ’sides all that, I washed my other dress this 
mornin’ — the one I wore yesterday.” Here a slight flush 
came into her forehead. “ ’N’ I ain’t got but two, so I 
had to put this ’ere one on. I hope ye won’t look at 
it dost, fer it’s awful — wuss ’n the other one.” 

“ Awful ? ” echoed Billy. “ Not at all ! ” 

“ Oh, yes, ’t is. Don’t tell me. It’s a heap wuss’n the 
other one, ’n’ that was bad’nough, goodness knows. I’m 
goin’ to wash this one, too, soon’s the other dries ’n’ I git 
it done up. It’s sech a nuisance to have only two 
dresses ! ” 

“Ye orter have a hundred thousand,” declared Billy. 

“ Oh, I reckon I’d be contented with three or four. 
I’ve kep’ purty dost to the house to-day fer fear some ’un 
r ud see me lookin’ so. I don’t want folks a-lookin’ down 
on my dirty clo’se,” she added, somewhat fiercely. 

Her change of tone and manner puzzled him. 

“ I’m sure I never thought o’ lookin’ down on yer 
clo’se,” he said, taking her words as an accusation against 
himself. 

At this point in the conversation Mrs. Pugsley stirred 
and opened her eyes. Billy had entirely forgotten her. 

“ Ye’ll have to pick out the lean bacon fer me nex’ time. 
Mariar,” she said, with the air of one who is conscious 
of a too exquisite sensibility to uncongenial influences. 
“I’ve alius said as my lungs was too weak fer fat meat.” 
And she spread herself out on her blankets, and incorpo- 
rate dampness. Billy wished heartily that she could have 
lain quiescent a moment longer, for when she got started 
there was no telling how long she might keep it up, and 


126 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


he wanted to fathom the mystery of Marias changed 
manner. To be obliged to listen to the old woman at 
this moment was distressing — it was to be tortured by 
the boots of love, as Shakespeare puts it. 

Maria did not notice her mothers interruption. She 
seemed to be thinking of other things. 

The moist woman continued : 

“When the weather gits settled hi the roads dry up so 
’t I can git out doors agin ’n’ my side quits a draggin’ the 
breath out o’ me, I shall want a pair o’ hoops. They 
was all the style in 'Frisco when we went through there 
two year' ago las' summer ’n’ I’ve alius wanted a pair ever 
sense. I’ve alius said as they was elegant, ye know I 
have, Mariar.” 

“Yes,” was the absent reply. 

“’N’ now ’t’ we’ve got a home o’ our own ’n’ livin’ in 
lux’ry, I don’t see why I can’t have ’em. They’d make a 
lady o’ me, as I orter be. I ain’t had nothin decent sense 
I was a Swipes, ’n’ seems to me it’s ’bout time to begin. 
I don’t see what I’ve done to go round lookin’ like I do. 
I’m sure I never done nothin’ ’n’ don’t intend to.” 

“Mebbe dad ’ll git ye a pair when he finds work,” said 
Maria, in the same absent way. 

“ I’ll never git ’em at all if I wait fer him,” said the 
moist woman with a sigh of ostentatious renunciation. 
“I’ve ast’em time ’n’agin fer ’em, ’n’.ye know’s well ’s I 
do ’t he never has money ’nough to buy proper grub fer 
the family, let alone hoops ’n’ lux’ries. Two year I’ve 
been at ’im constant, ’n’ no hoops yit nor like to be. 
Oh, well, I reckon I can give ’em up, same’s I’ve had to 
everything else all my life long, though there’s them 
about ’ere as own gold mines ’n’ could make me a present 
o’ ’em ’n’ never feel it if they ’d a mind. But I don’t 
complain. ’Tain’t in nater fer me to git what I want. 
Though I never could see why.” And she settled back 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA//. 


I27 

ajs only a woman can to whom the longing for finery has 
brought a realization of the barrenness of time and cir- 
cumstance. 

“ Mebbe I could have a pair sent up fer ye by the nex’ 
stage/' said Billy, beginning to see the drift of the moist 
woman's remarks. “Would it suit ye to take 'em as a 
present from me? I’m sure I’d be joyful." 

The old woman disposed of — Billy would have been 
willing to purchase her silence at this moment with un- 
limited car-loads of crinolines — he turned once more to 
Maria. Had he said anything to annoy her? He could 
not think of anything. And yet at the moment of Mrs. 
Pugsley’s interruption a new mood had unmistakably en- 
tered into her look and tone. He longed to understand 
her, — he was certain he could if he had but half a chance, 
— her likes and dislikes were a study for which he felt he 
had an especial genius. It was with a sense of hurry lest 
she should say something to increase his bewilderment 
that he asked : 

“ Have I done anything out o’ the way, Mariar ? " His 
voice shook in spite of him. “I didn't mean it, on my 
word — ” 

She opened her eyes wide in surprise. 

“ You done anything ? ” she asked, and he felt a revival 
of self-confidence in her frank tone. “ Why, no, what put 
that into yer head ? " 

“Suthin’ye said 'bout yer gownd, I reckon. But, no 
matter. It’s all right now. I’m sure it don’t look dirty at 
all. Ye look — beautiful." 

He was smiling, but he uttered the word earnestly, with 
a palpitating eagerness. For an instant he regretted it, 
dreading that it should offend her; then he would not 
have recalled it if he could. He had told her that he 
admired her, and she must see that he. was greatly in 
earnest. 


128 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


She did not seem offended. She only laughed again — 
they both laughed a great deal, Billy thought — but this 
time her laughter was not mirthful. He did not like the 
sound of it ; it made him feel for the first time in his life 
that it is a disadvantage to live in ignorance of the mental 
processes of one’s neighbors. 

“Oh, I don’t mean you” she said. She looked restless , 
and discontented with herself, impressing him with the 1 
idea that she was trying to conceal something. The flush 
on her forehead deepened and she commenced plaiting 
her old gown between her fingers. “ I meant other folks. 
All men ain’t lik ejyou, ye know. All men ain’t got yer 
kind heart ’n’ friendly ways. ” 

He could have thrown himself at her feet then and 
there. He leanecf forward with a great yearning, strain- 
ing toward the discovery of some further response to his 
love, but she did not look at him, she did not seem to be 
thinking of him at all. Her eyes were employed with her 
hands as if under a doom to plait and unplait her soiled 
gown a given number of times a minute. 

He drew back as if she had openly repulsed his ten- 
derness, yet quivering with a desire to pour out his heart 
to her. His pulses fluttered noisily ; it was on the tip of 
his tongue to tell her then and there of his hope that she 
would care for him, that she would let him care for her 
always ; but her strange manner held him back. She 
seemed all at once so nervous, so irritable ; what reaction ; 
from his conduct could have made her so ? He could 
not understand it, and yet with the delusion of a generous 
nature he commenced to explain her mood to her advan- 
tage. Probably she had divined his feelings and was an- 
noyed at the immoderate speed of his love-making, most 
likely that was it ; but that ought to make her conscious 
of his presence rather than forgetful of it, as she seemed 
to be. Well, perhaps he was not capable of understand- 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


129 

mg her so readily as he hau supposed. All he could make 
of the matter was that women are strange. 

She had stopped plaiting her gown now and was sit- 
ting with her hands loosely clasped but with the air ot 
one who waits uneasily. Then another change passed 
over her. She straightened herself in her chair, as if 
bracing for a physical effort, while her eyes met his in 
defiance of his opinion of what she intended to say. Her 
cheeks and forehead burned, and while her brows frowned, 
her lips framed themselves in a tremulous .smile whi&h 
contradicted the carelessness with which she tried to 
speak. 

Billy looked at her in wonder. This was not the 
Maria of five minutes before. She saw his surprise as a 
sick man may notice a look of alarm on his attendant’s 
face, but ignored its significance and concentrated her 
thoughts as for a mental spring. 

“ Who is the man that talked with you out there by the 
gate yesterday ? ” 

She leaned toward him, clutching her hands together 
and fixing her eyes upon his face a little below his return- 
ing gaze. 

“ That? ” answered Billy, surprised anew. “Why, that 
was Jim Hulse. I thought I told ye.” 

She shook herself impatiently. She was not in a mood 
to be misunderstood. 

“I don’t mean his name. I knowed that. Can’t y« 
understan’ what I want?” With all her impatience she 
tried to speak as if making a casual inquiry. “I mean, 
what’s he like?” 

“Ye saw him, didn’t ye? ’’answered Billy. “Can’t ye 
jedge fer yerself?” 

She shook herself again. 

“ No, what’s he like ? ” Her voice rang high and hard. 

“Id! know hardly what he is like,” replied Billy, shrink- 

9 


130 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


in g slightly from her excited looks. “ He’s a mighty queei 
man. That’s all I know.” 

“ Ye said he read books.” 

4 ‘Yes.” 

“Ye’ve seen ’im a-doin’ it ? ” 

“ Many a time. Books with queer letters in ’em.” 

“What else?” 

“ What else does he read, d’ye mean ? ” 

“Oh, can't ye understan’ ? ” she cried, angrily. And then 
in a voice of under-toned incisiveness, “I wish ’t / could 
read books. Books like that.” 

She unclasped her hands with a quick wrench and 
folded her arms tightly across her bosom. 

“Oh, I can read,” she cried, meeting Billy’s eyes for 
the first time. But she looked away again as she went 
on. “Not good, though. Not the way I’d like to. Not 
the way he reads.” 

“Well, I never took much stock in learnin’, nohow,” 
remarked Billy. 

“ Nor I ! ” she answered with a shrill laugh. She tossed 
her head and drew her arms closer together across her 
bosom. “ Other folks does though. He does.” 

“ ’Tain’t necessary fer a miner,” Billy said, his voice 
thickening in spite of him. “Jim Hulse ain’t no happier 
fer it. Nor no better off.” 

She did not seem to hear him. 

“Ye said he’d murdered some one, wunst. I believe it. 
He could do it with his eyes. He could do anything 
with them eyes o’ his. They burnt into me. I feel ’em 
yit.” 

“He aint got a good repytation, I know that.” Billy 
uttered the words with a secret satisfaction of which he 
was more than half ashamed. “ But they ain’t no proof 
o’ anything wrong with ’im. He ain’t done nothin’ out o’ 
the way senge he come ’ere. It’s only what folks says.” 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VI L AH. 


131 

‘'More shame to ’em ! ” exclaimed Maria with sudden 
heat, unfolding her arms and facing him with the look of 
a champion. But something in his glance must have 
confused her for she dropped her eyes and commenced 
plaiting her gown again. “I only meant ’t folks ’d 
better be ’tendin’ to their own bizness. It’s the least 
they can do.” 

She did not look at him for some time, and when she 
did it was as if shrinking from what he might think of 
her. 

“ What makes ye look ’n’ talk like that ’bout ’im ? ” cried 
Billy, urged to expression by a twinge of honest jealousy. 
“What’s Jim Hulse ’n’ his murders to you P If ye’re 
int’rested in ’im ” 

She burst into a shrill scream of laughter. Mrs. Pugsley 
opened her eyes and uttered a faint protest which Maria 
did not hear. 

“Me int’rested in ’im ?”she cried, still laughingin that 
exaggerated, hysterical way. “Well, if that ain’t good ! 
Me int’rested in that air feller ? As well ask if he’s 
int’rested in me ! Oh, Lord, I shall die a-laughin’, I 
know I shall ! ” 

At this moment Mr. Pugsley came in from a successful 
tour among the saloons, and the conversation took a more 
general turn. When Billy rose to go Maria accompanied 
him out upon the porch, inviting him to come again and 
often. Her usual manner had returned and nothing could 
be more genuine than the frank cordiality of her looks 
and words. 

“Ye’re the only feller here ’t I know or am likely to 
know,” she said. “ So ye mustn’t go back on me. I don’t 
like fellers, gen’rally. But you seem jes’ like a brother. 
I’ll have my other dress washed ’n’ ironed by to-morrer, 
’n’ then I’ll look better, mebbe. Ye’d better call aroun ’n’ 
see. ” 




i3 2 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


There was no mistaking her friendliness. She did 
car e for him. 

“Ye alius look well ’nough for me,” he replied, gal- 
lantly. 

,And he went away happy in spite of his bewilderment, 
though half convinced all the time that his recent doubt 
would produce a certain result on his future lot. But it 
was impossible to be jealous of Jim Hulse. Jim hated 
women, and Billy remembered the fact as an item in his 
own favor. 

“ That air young feller,” said Ephraim, regarding Billy’s 
retreating figure with the bleared eye of tipsy affection, 
“ w’y — I’d like to be that air young feller’s daddy, I 
would. I — w’y — I love that air feller a’ready like h^was 
my own son. ’Markable chap he mus’ be to work on me 
so quick ’n’ hard — eh, Mariar ? He’s got a claim up ’ere 
’t promises millions. I’ve jes’ been hearin’ ’bout it down 
to Boozey’s. Everybody’s talkin’ ’bout it. He’s the mos' 
successful miner o’ the age, Mariar ! ” 

“ I’m glad o’ it,” was her quiet answer. “ He’s a good 
feller, Billy is, ’n’ I like ’im. I think he’ll make good use 
o’ his money. He deserves to git rich, if anybody does.’ 1 

And she would say no more. ' 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


133 


CHAPTER XVI. 

From her infancy Maria Pugsley had been imbued with 
the republican sentiment, — a substitute for religion among 
people of her class, — that she was as good as anybody 
and didn’t propose to be looked down upon, an opinion 
which resulted in an incalculable sequence of ideas, as 
republican sentiments sometimes do. For having pro- 
gressed so far as to believe herself as good as anybody, 
she felt in duty bound to back her equality by a willing- 
ness to fight for it ; after which there followed a devel- 
opment from the negative resolution not to be looked 
down upon to the positive conviction that in her ability 
to take care of herself she was superior to other people 
and therefore ought to be looked up to ; which was fol- 
lowed in turn by a disposition to fight for her superiority, 
should it be called in question. Unconscious of any 
standard of excellence except personal independence, — 
she never dreamed that her kind-heartedness and love of 
justice were excellent qualities, — she clattered about in 
her little world as proud of the noise she made as a small 
boy in large boots. Once her father, in a casual fit of 
remonstrance, told her that she was always too full of 
herself to walk easy, and she retorted that if there was as 
much of him as there was of her, his wretched little body 
couldn’t bear the strain five minutes, but would split open 
like a potato in hot ashes. Her opinion of herself was 
extraordinary, working out a half-pitying contempt for all 
pleasures that were not of her kind, and for all employ- 
ments of which she was ignorant ; she screamed and 
yelled and thought herself very remarkable indeed, never 
imagining that she was on a level with the savage who 
sends his challenging war-cry through his small expanse 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H 


134 

of forest. It is natural to take pride in one’s supremacy, 
though it be only a supremacy of bad dreams ; and the 
points on which Maria prided herself were her high temper 
and her strong will. She was so accustomed to exert an 
absolute authority at home that her confidence in her 
ability to rule the world at large, — by which is always 
meant one’s little circle of acquaintances, — had grown to 
astonishing proportions, together with a disposition to 
exact the admiration of her associates for her masculine 
force of character. 

It puzzled her considerably that she should all at once 
be overcome by a sort of fierce jealousy of this Hulse’s 
power to “ read books ” ; she had never believed very 
seriously in the enjoyments of learning — certainly she 
had never discovered much enjoyment in trying to read, 
it was such a bother to spell through the words ; but it 
nettled her to know that this man could do something 
which she could not. She could account for her envy 
only on the grounds that she was getting weak-minded, 
and she assured herself repeatedly in her moments of 
solitary meditation, that she must “brace up.” It was 
an evidence of weak-mindedness that she hated him as 
she did, for she was. certain that her feeling for him was 
nothing short of hatred ; if she were her old independent 
self, his behavior and accomplishments would be nothing 
to her one way or the other ; he could read books and 
look superior till he dropped into his grave, for all she 
would care. But as long as she was not quite herself — 
she wondered whether she was in her dotage ! — why, the 
thing to do was to pull herself together and be as much 
like herself as possible. 

Whenever she thought of Hulse’s manner on that day 
at the gate, she was filled with such rebellion as a high- 
mettled horse feels against the hand that would force the 
bit between its teeth and lead it away. Not that he had 


THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


*35 


made any attempt to subdue her, or was likely to do so ; 
she would like to catch him at it ; it was the secret assur- 
ance she had that if he did attempt such a thing, he would 
succeed, — at least to the extent of making her feel small 
and weak. The look of the man left among her vagrant 
ideas a sense of power that worried and exasperated her. 
The thought of what he might do with her made her feel 
as if floating helplessly in strong infinite waters ; he 
seemed a keen elemental force, capable of working a will 
resistlessly and pitilessly — an electric flash with a con- 
sciousness. He thrilled her with a sort of suspense, as 
if he were that mysterious interval between a cause and 
its effect Maria could have expressed nothing of this, 
but she had a vivid longing to follow him, to watch the 
outcome of such electric intensity, to discover on what 
he expended his conserved force and fire. It was more 
than woman’s curiosity with her ; it was a dreadful 
fatality. She could not free herself from the thought of 
him. He made night hideous by visiting her dreams. 
Once she dreamed that she was wandering alone in a 
desert, and the moon was shining with ghostly steadiness 
in a black sky ; and as she walked she stumbled upon the 
trunkless, bloody head of a man, and bending down saw, 
by the wan light, Hulse’s eyes glaring up at her with 
vacant, burning pertinacity. 

And, indeed, Hulse might have puzzled and haunted 
one more accustomed to psychic wonders than Maria. 
His movements contradicted his eyes, for his demeanor 
was quiet, even subdued; the lava-heat was all within, 
but thus more terrible because its ebullitions could not be 
calculated on. What was known of the daily habits of 
his life tightened the grasp which his appearance took on 
the imagination. He lived alone, spoke little to those he 
met, and apparently promised as little to himself as to 
others. He acknowledged no claims and took no notice 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


136 

of other souls except at a distance. Yet it was plain he 
felt no pride in maintaining this spiritual solitude, and 
found no compensation in anything for the hopelessness 
of living. He had worn his life to a rag which he did 
not throw away because the effort was too much trouble. 
If you had an imagination, you would picture him with 
the traits of a Druid priest, — problematic qualities sug- 
gesting a divine calling degraded by infernal practices ; 
he was like one who has talked with God face to face and 
afterward fallen to an abject, inglorious destiny. 

Maria longed to show her contempt for him, to prove 
that she was not so despicable as she had appeared that day. 
She longed for an opportunity to convince him that she 
was not to be consigned unresistingly to a corner by any 
lordly opinion of his. Her pride in her superior strength 
of character was of too substantial a growth to shrink at 
once and die out at an adverse breath of criticism ; but in 
spite of assuring herself to the contrary, that pride was un- 
dergoing important modifications. It had received a shock 
which- deadened it a little, — just enough to make it want 
to appear livelier than ever. The change was not in her 
nature, but in the conditions of her nature ; she felt it as 
subtly and with such dread as she would have felt the 
first doubt of her sanity. She told herself over and over 
that she cared nothing for what Hulse thought of her, but 
in her soul she realized that her resistance to his estimate 
was only a childish makeshift, a puerile, evasion of the 
bitter truth that she must, soon or late, make some sort 
of open confession of his mastery. But she would make 
no confession yet. She had failed to assert herself as she 
ought to have done when Hulse stood talking with Billy 
at the gate. No matter. There were other days coming, 
she told herself angrily ; it was not too late yet. Failure 
acts either as an anodyne ora stimulant, — it always acted 
as the latter on Maria. She worked herself into a great 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA II. 


1 37 


passion imagining what she would say to him the next 
time she met him. She hated herself when she remem- 
bered the moment of relenting in which she almost be- 
lieved he had not seen her that day. He had seen her; 
she was sure of it now, — he had seen her as he saw the 
gate-post and the broken wheelbarrow out by the fence, 
settling her value in the scale of things with one glance of 
his all-comprehending eyes. The gall of his indifference 
left a bitter flavor in her thoughts always. Though she 
knew next to nothing of the ways of civilization, she di- 
vined instinctively that his indifference resulted from un- 
consciously employing the standards of polite society for 
measuring a barbarian, — a process which consigned her 
at once to a position at the very bottom of the social stra- 
tum. He employed the standard unconsciously ; therein 
consisted the prime cause of Maria’s resentment, — he did 
not know that he had passed judgment on her at all. 
She would not have been so angry had he made her feel 
his power by a direct effort of his will ; she could have 
screamed defiance at him then and hooted his opinion out 
of existence ; besides, a conscious effort on his part would 
have implied certain strong qualities of her own to call 
forth such effort. But this indifference was unbearable. 
Well ! she promised that she would show him yet that she 
was a very positive existence of bone, muscle and nerve 
which no pre-judgment of his could metamorphose into a 
nonentity. She dramatized herself standing before him in 
strong self-assertion, wagging her head and overwhelm- 
ing him with a torrent of loud-mouthed scorn. She went 
about her work with contracted brows, studying contemp- 
tuous things to say to him. Anarchy in time makes laws 
for itself, and after a little Maria settled into comparative 
quiet under the soothing assurance that when she met 
Hulse again, she wouLd be ready for him. She did not 
speculate on what her sensations after the battle might be. 

I 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


138 


CHAPTER XVII. 

One afternoon Mrs. Pugsley and her two daughters were 
sitting in the room that faced the river. They had yielded 
to the flaccid silence which fell upon them habitually when 
left for a considerable time together. Maud Eliza was 
nursing her knee with vacant industry, meanwhile sway- 
ing her body back and forth and keeping her eyes fast- 
ened upon a knot-hole in the floor as if that phenomenon 
were an immediate and all-absorbing object of study. 
Maria was darning stockings and the moist woman lay quite 
still on her blankets under one of the windows, enjoying 
that irresponsible blank comfort which is a habit with peo- 
ple whose lives have been rendered shapeless by idleness. 
Mrs. Pugsley was more comfortable in Havilah than she 
had been for years before, and it may be said to her credit 
that she was more cheerful, in a manner too ; but her 
manner was peculiar and she would still have produced on 
susceptible strangers the effect of long continued rainy 
weather. She still had spells of purposeless weeping in 
which she took pains to inform her family that she was 
not complaining of her lot ; and she admonished her 
daughters daily to consider how happily she was married 
and to go and do likewise. Once she became violently 
figurative and told them that “if they was to take a fine- 
tooth comb V scratch the world over with it, they couldn't 
find 'nother man like her Ephraim,” and presently she fell 
to commiserating herself as “a no 'count critter as never 
had no joy nor comfort, 'n' the world alius trod on,” 
Maria understood perfectly that her mother was as happy 
as it was in her nature to be, and always spoke to her 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


1 39 

cheerfully. She was very patient with her mother. She 
had located her mother’s odd tastes very accurately and 
knew just where to put her finger on them. We are all 
little earths marked over with meridians and parallels on 
which our peculiarities are easily located. 

In her long years of nomadic improvidence Mrs. Pugs- 
ley had almost forgotten to dream of the luxury of a 
home, and now that she had all at once stumbled into one 
which answered her ideal requirements, it is probable 
that, in spite of her frequent low spirits, no Roman volupt- 
uary ever felt more supremely contented, stretched full 
length under a green arbutus, quaffing wine. The digni- 
ty of living under a roof caused her at times to assume an 
air of sentimental benignity such as familiarity with lux- 
ury may be supposed to produce. And frequently she 
would sit up among her blankets with a feeble assumption 
of the duties of motherhood and for a few moments give 
indiscriminate orders to everybody with the importance 
of a woman of exalted social standing who has many 
claims on her attention ; or she would be quite still for 
two or three hours with the introspective look of one who 
has gazed too long into the deep stream of life, and finally 
rouse herself to express a solemn opinion of the dinner or 
the weather. 

Outside, the big valley seems conscious of its beauty 
in the spring’s bridal garments. It is a flash of bright 
coloring, an outline of marvelous forms. The pines 
on the foothills are mixed indiscriminately with 
their shadows, the young cottonwoods rise like ex- 
plosions of green spray. One of the nearer foothills 
is as smooth and round and softly-tinted as a woman’s 
cheek. The river flows under the trees in the faint, 
tender sunshine which touches all shadowed water, but 
a little further on it flashes into light, eager to prove 
its power to unite heaven and earth in its clear current. 


140 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


As you walk, your feet crush through worlds of violets 
and pale blue iris blossoms, till you can fancy you are 
walking in the sky. The sunshine affects you like Roman 
goblets of Massic wine. Birds, giddy with the sunshine, 
hang over the earth in an ecstasy of thanksgiving, going 
in and out of the blue sky at will. Here a crystal spring 
flashes among long grasses like a girl’s bright eyes from 
beneath dishevelled hair. A distant dome gleams in the 
sun like a great pale emerald ; on the far mountains the 
pines are a faint growth of fungus ; the clouds are angels’ 
wings, and everywhere, everywhere, throughout the length 
and breadth of the valley, are flowers, nothing but flowers, 
you think, like materialized sunbeams. It is Eden, planted 
by God’s hand. You float on the slow, monotonous music 
of the river, which has the stately movement and rhythm 
of clouds. You are rejuvenated, illuminated, transfigured. 
The sweet growth which throbs through nature’s rapid 
pulses becomes a part of your spiritual evolution, and 
you long to sing with reverent joy, like a child at play in the 
sunshine. God is love, and this life He has given us is the 
highest expression of that love ! 

From the two windows of the front room of the Pugsley 
cabin, a magnificent view of the valley and the mountains 
could be obtained. The window under which Mrs. Pugs- 
ley lay looked toward the near foothills where the sun- 
touched pines rose from the shadows like smoke from 
unseen chimneys. The afternoon was well advanced, 
yet the mist still hung on one rounded summit there and 
stirred in the wind as lightly as a layer of thistle-down. 
The long, warm sunbeams made the air palpitate with the 
sweet, vivid heat of spring ; the sky was blue, with here 
and there a light pellucid ripple of cirrus cloud ; a flock ol 
white doves circled over the cottonwoods by the river, 
beating upward with wings whose shadows were like 
light. On the far edge of the valley the mountains loomed 


IN THE VALLE Y OF HA VILAH. 1 4 1 

black above their talus of white cloud ; higher up they 
turned to white again and clung to the sky like a purer 
growth of it. There is something in these high horizons 
which is indescribably sweet and tender, which accom- 
panies, but is distinct from, the rugged force of mountain 
summits. It can be compared only to something spiritual 
and holy. It is the communion of old friendship, the full 
silence of long-reciprocated love. The sky and the moun- 
tains know and love each other ; they have lain face to 
face and heart to heart since the beginning of the world. 

Maria liked the garrulous reserve of the river, and it 
was as an unbearable discord that she suddenly heard a 
singer in a saloon not far off lift up his voice and apos- 
trophize Jenny to wait till the clouds roll by. 

Mrs. Pugsley opened her eyes and listened. She had 
nothing to do, — nothing even to think, one might add, — 
and was disposed to yield to the persuasion of lyric in- 
fluences. 

“ What a purty voice that air fellerVgot,”she remarked 
with sentiment. “ The tune ’s ruther too much like the 
oppery, though, ’n’ I never went much on them oppery 
tunes. But it ’s reel sweet, his voice is. It ’minds me o’ 
the times the fellers used to come a-serenadin’ o’ me up to 
the Bar.” 

Maria shrugged her shoulders and went on darning. 

“ Them was gay times, gay times,” continued the moist 
woman in the pattering, gosling-like voice she had lately 
assumed when recurring to the days of her youth. “How 
the fellers used to come a-turkeyin' aroun' after me in them 
days ! ’N’ how we used to set aroun’ on the door-steps, 

laffin’ ’n’ singin till midnight ’n’ past ! ’N’ oh, the fun we 

had, — folks d’ know how to have fun nowheres but to 
Swipes’s Bar, seems to me.” 

The song continued. 

“Why don’t ye jine in V sing along o’ ’im, Maria? 


142 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


’N’ Maud Elizy, too ? I would myself if didn’t have sech 
a rippin’ pain in my side. If they’s anything I like to 
hear ’n’ reely enjoy ’n’ feel good over, it ’s a man ’n' 
woman singin’ together. Jine in— jine in — ye can sing ! ” 

“ Oh, yes, I can sing if ye’ll git a crow ’n’ a bull-frog to 
help me, ’’said Maria. 

“Maud Elizy ’ll help ye,” said the provident mother. 
“Won’t ye, Maud Elizy ? ” 

“Thankee, / ain’t no crow nor bull-frog,” responded 
that lively damsel with unexpected acuteness. “ ’N’ I 
don’t ’pose to be used fer one ! ” 

“Well, go on ’n’ try it, anyhow, Maria. Ye know them 
words, — I’ve heerd ye sing ’em. I've been longin’ fer a 
coon’s age fer some music. Strike in ’n’ mebbe he’ll sing 
it over again with ye ! ” 

“/sing?” cried Maria with a touch of impatience. 
“Ye knows well’s I do’t if I was to sing fer sour beans I 
couldn’t git a smell ! ” 

“I’d like to hear ye, I’ve been longin’ fer music,” sighed 
Mrs. Pugsley in a manner which showed that her aspira- 
tions for the unattainable were mounting in proportion as 
her material wants were supplied. Then she added in 
one of her desultory moods of maternal instruction. “But 
I won’t urge ye. ’Tain’t no use to urge folks — I’ve noticed 
that. ’N’ I’ve tried to teach my young ’uns the same idee. 
’Tain’t in human nater, Maria, to want to be urged ; Maud 
Elizy, remember that. ” And she adjusted herself on the 
blankets with the air of a tireless student of humanity who 
has imparted the results of long experience. 

Having disposed of the music and delivered herself of 
this sage advice, she turned to other subjects. Hers was 
a facile mind in which ideas glided easily past each other, 
like the molecules of a liquid. 

“ It’s very comf’table here, Mariar,”she remarked, with 
a consciousness of her new and advantageous position in 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VIL AH. 


143 

society. “ Leastways it would be, if I could fergit my 
side. I hain’t had so much to be thankful fer sence Dad 
run under, up there to the Bar. Tain’t no more ’n I de- 
serve, though, after all I’ve gone through ’n’ put up with. 
I’ve earned it, I can say that, honest ’nough. I never 
done nothin’ not to have things. T wa’n't my fault ’t we 
didn’t show off more in the world. O’ late years I’d sort 
o’ give up all hopes o’ ever ’mountin’ to anything, though 
I used to calc’late on it when we was fust married. This 
’ere life in a house o’ our own is jes’ ’bout what I reckoned 
it ’ud be — ’tain’t nothin’ but what I was used to in my 
thoughts.” And she sighed with a half-realization of the 
fact that an attained ambition is nothing more than a 
repetition of memories. 

“ ’Tain’t our house, nohow,” put in Maria. “ It’s 
Billy’s, — we ain’t got no call to speak o’ it like it b’longed 
to us.” 

“ Oh, well, it’s all the same,” was the old woman’s 
answer. “ He’ll be in the fam'ly ’fore long hisself. 
Don’t ye see he’s gone on ye, Mariar — clean gone? ’N’ 
o’ course ye’ll git ’im if ye can. Ephraim says his pros- 
pecks is way-up. ” 

Maria did not answer, but she looked as if she con- 
sidered herself capable of deciding that matter for herself. 


144 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH 


CHAPTER XVIII. 

All at once Maud Eliza commenced tittering. 

“ He’ll make a purty addition onto the fam’ly, Billy 
Bling will,” she said. “ Don’t ye reckon so, Mariar?” 

“ I reckon he looks ’s well ’s what we do,” replied 
Maria, jerking her big needle through the stocking she 
w*as darning. “We don’t none o’ us han’sim much, I 
take it.” 

Maud Eliza held her nose between her thumb and foie- 
finger and then “let go ” with a tremendous snort. 

“ Oh, yes,” she cried, gurgling and strangling in her 
hilarity, “he’ll make a monstrous purty addition, he will. 
Scrubby red moustaches is a addition onto any fam’ly. 
The Pugsleys ’ll be proud, they will ! ” 

“ Well, they orter,” said Maria, briefly. 

“ Oh, they will ! ” repeated Maud Eliza. She swayed 
back and forth on the candle-box which she had turned 
on end for a seat, and then in another sudden explosive 
snort lost her balance and rolled over upon the floor, still 
tittering uninterruptedly. 

“Well, if ye ain’t a bird!” said Maria, ironically. 
“Ye never missed a note, I vow ! ” 

Maud Eliza collected herself and sat up on the floor to 
secure herself from any further treachery on the part of 
gravity. 

“ Well, when’s the weddin’ goin’ to be?” she asked as 
soon as she could stop giggling sufficiently to speak. 

“ Ask me no questions ’n’ I’ll tell ye no lies,” replied 
Maria. “Ye won’t have no finger in that pie, I can tell 
ye,” she added, positively. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


*45 

“ I’ll bet ye’ll be two awful clinks when ye wunst git 
reg’larly spoony on each other,” said Maud Eliza with 
another series of titters. 

“ Q\you know all ’bout that,” retorted her sister. 

“ Yes,” admitted Maud Eliza, with an engaging snort, 
“I’ve got that down fine. I reckon, ’’she supplemented 
with some pride, “I know how to spoon ’s well ’s any 
gal in Californy.” 

“When Mariar gits married,” put in Mrs. Pugsley, 
“ she can do jes’ what she likes. She can turn Billy 
round ’n’ round ’er finger, that’s plain ’nough. ’N’ that ’ll 
suit ’er. ” 

“Oh, yes,” answered Maria, “that’ll suit me. They 
ain’t nothin’ I like to do ’s well ’s to do what I like.” 

“ I hope ye’ll be a good wife,” continued the moist 
woman, falling into another didactic maternal mood. 
“ I’m sure ye’ve had examples in me. , N’ they ain’t no 
use bein’ otherways. It’s the least a wooman can do.” 

“ Well, I d’ know,” answered Maria, biting off her yarn 
and drawing another thread through her n eedle. ‘ ‘ I ain’t 
got no wish to make myself so pious ’s to feel the wings 
a-sproutin’ on my shoulders — not in this world. That 
ain’t the kind o’ hollyhock I am.” 

“ Billy’s a nice feffer,” remarked Mrs. Pugsley. 

“ Yes, he’s a nice feller. I wonder ’t he £tays ’ere in 
Havilah ’mongst all these scrubs. He’s too good to ’sociate 
with ’em.” 

“He’ll prob’ly build ’nother house in camp ’n’ let us 
stay in this’un. ’Tain’t no more ’n fair’t he should, after 
all ’t I’ve gone through. Yer pa ’n’ Maud Elizy 9 n’ me can 
come over ’n’_ stay with ye two-three weeks to a time. 
It ’ud be great times to have two houses like that to wunst 
’n’ go from one to t’other ’n’ stay ’s long’s ye wanted to.” 

The women were silent for a little while, Maud Eliza 
swaying herself back and forth on the floor with her eyes 

IQ 


146 in the valley of ilavilah ; 

fixed once more upon the knot-hole. Maria had made up 
her mind not to get angry at the turn conversation had 
taken, no matter what was said. 

Pausing for a moment in her work, her eyes fell upon 
the rose- vine outside the window. 

“ How putty them roses is ! ” she says. “ The smell o’ 
em sorter goes through ’n’ through me on a day like this. ” 

“ What roses? ” asked Mrs. Pugsley, languidly. “ Oh, 
ye mean them things out o’ the winder.” 

“Yes, Billy fastened ’em up, ye know, a day or two 
after we got ’ere. ” 

“Billy, Billy, Billy!” mimicked Maud Eliza. “It’s 
nothin’ but Billy from daylight to dark, till sometime I 
think we’re livin’ with a lot o’ goats n’ ye’re callin’ one o’ 
’em. If my stummick wa’n’t strong, I’m sure I couldn’t 
stan’it.” She ended with her customary snort. 

Mrs. Pugsley shook her head reprovingly. 

“Ye mustn’t make fun o’ ’er, Maud Elizy,” she said in 
admonitory tones. “Ye d’ know how soon ye’ll git gone 
on some feller yerself, ’n’ then ye wouldn’t like to have 
folks n-w orr yin’ jyou. Cert’nly Mariar has a right to speak 
o’ Billy ’n’ the roses. It’s only proper ’s long’s he helped 
’er fix the vine.” 

“If they should be a dance or anything the roses ’ud be 
nice to wear in my hair,” said Maud Eliza meditatively. 

Mrs. Pugsley ’s vaporous features were illuminated by a 
ray of satisfaction. 

“D’ye hear that, Mariar!” she said. “That’s jes’ the 
way I used to feel when I was a gal. Maud Elizy ’s Swipes 
all over ! ” 

“Yes, she’s Swipes all over,” admitted Maria, grimly. 

There was another silence of a few moments, broken 
only by the noise of the river and the whirr of the doves 
returning over the cottonwoods. 

“I had ’nother one o’ my dreams las’ night,” the moist 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VI LA II. 


147 

woman finally said, writhing on her blankets and adjust- 
ing her skirts. (This process of adjustment was by no 
means a simple one, as the crinoline promised by Billy 
had become an accomplished fact). * * They's suthin goin' 
to happen. I alius know they s troubles a-brewin’ when 
I commence to dream. ” 

“What was it 'bout ? ” asked Maria. 

“ W’y, it was 'bout Billy. Talkin' 'bout 'm was what 
brought it into my mind. I thought we was all o' us 'ere 
in this room, you 'n' me 'n' Maud Elizy ’n’ yer pa, 'n' ye 
was gittin’ dinner ’n' the rest o’ us was settin’ 'round the 
way we alius be. 'N' says I, ‘ What be we a-goin' to have 
fer dinner? ' perfectly natral, as ye may say. ‘N’,' says 
you, ‘ Greens.’ ‘Greens ? ' says I, 's joyful 's could be, fer 
I alius dearly loved greens from way-back. ‘ Mariar,’ 
says I, * I’ll cook fhe greens. ’ 'N' I got up off'n my blan- 

kets 'n' says, ‘We!ll bile 'em with that air ham-bone what’s 
hangin’ up in the woodshed. ’ ‘No,’ says you, ‘ We’ll save 

that till nex’ time. I’ve got suthin better to cook ’em with 
to-day.' ’N’ I looked into the kittle ’t was simmerin’ away 
on the stove, ’n’ there was Billy Bling in there, a-bilin’ ’n’ 
a-stewin'; ’n’ every minute or two his face 'ud come up 
to the top ’n’ look at us reproachful, while we was starin’ 
into the kittle, ’n’ then sink again. ’N’ ye give a sort o’ 
screech ’n' says, ‘ Oh, I didn’t think he'd look like that or I 
wouldn’t a-done it ! Let’s put in more greens so 's to cover 
'm up.’ 'N' we put the greens in, but it didn't do no good. 
Every minute or two the bubblin’ water 'ud fetch 'is face to 
the top, 'n' he'd stare at us in that orflegashly way 'n' then 
go under agin’. ’N’ by 'm by I woke up. I d' know 
what it means, but it’s suthin’. I never knowed myself to 
dream like that fer nothin’.” 

Maria shuddered. 

“ I don't b'lieve in dreams,” she said. 

‘ ‘ Well, I do, '♦declared the moist woman. Her thoughts, 


I 4 8 /iV THE VALLEY OF II AVI L AH. 

which were evidently in a liquid state, flowed readily in- 
to any channel that was made for them, and she rambled 
on in an inconsequent way. “That ’minds me to ask 
what ’twas’t Billy sent over to-day in that air brown pa- 
per package. D’ I hear ye say chicken ? ” 

“ Yes — ’n’ apples for pies.” 

“We’ll have ’em for dinner to-morrer, won’t we?” 

“ Yes, I’m goin’ to ask Billy to come down ’n’ eat with 
us if 1 see him ’fore then. If he furnishes the grub, he 
orter help eat it.” 

The chicken was a sweet smell in Mrs. Pugsley’s nos- 
trils. 

“ I like the gizzard best,’’ said she. “I alius took the 
gizzard when we had chicken up there to the Bar. Dad 
used to tell me it was the same with him back in Arkan- 
saw when he was young. That must-be a great country 
back there, Mariar. Ye orter a-heerd dad tell ’bout it. 
He’d go on by the hour, jes’s interestin’. I’ve alius felt 
bad ’t I wan’t borned there. It’s a splendid country, ev- 
erything right to a feller’s hand, ’n’ folks so sociable like.’’ 
She thought of these days with something of the regretful 
envy with which the later Romans regarded their ances- 
tors under Augustus. “If we was ever to git able to ’ford 
it, I’d like to go back there ’n’see things. Mebby Billy ’ll 
whack up, by’m by — he’ll be sure to have money ’nough 
fer anything, ’n I don’t reckon he’ll be stingy. Who’s that 
cornin’ into the gate ?” 

Maria glanced out of the window. 

“Good Lord, it’s that Hulse ! ” she said faintly. 

“The feller ’t his hosses pulled us out o’ the mud that 
day? — the one that sorter don’t look to hum in hisself?” 
asked Mrs. Pugsley in her vaporous way. “ Well, you 
go to the door — but wait till I fix myself.” She sat up on 
her blankets, adjusted her gown carefully, taking care 
that the crinoline should show through her thin calico 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


149 



skirt ; smoothed her hair after moistening her palm with 
her tongue, and put on an expression as if sitting to an 
artist. 

At first something like a sickness came over Maria, — a 
chill feeling of expansion, as if she were passing into so- 
lution ; then her heart gave a great leap and her strength 
came back. She became conscious of a stage of aggre- 
gation in the process of thinking. The slight which Hulse 
had put upon her, her longings for retaliation heaped 
themselves up in her ; she was not afraid of him now — she 
longed to meet him. Her anger rose with a resistless 
swell — she felt as if she were crouching for a spring that 
would destroy him. She laid her work down on the floor 
by the box on which she was seated, and stuck her darn- 
ing-needle firmly into the window ledge ; then she rose 
and squared herself toward the door with her hands on 
her hips. 

She was ready for him. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H 


150 


- CHAPTER XIX 

As Hulse came up to the Pugsley cabin, he did not raise 
his eyes until he stood on the veranda. He might have 
told Maria his errand — for he had come on an errand — 
and gone away as ignorant of her existence as before, 
had he not noticed her aggressive attitude and the warlike 
expression of her face. 

He saw before him a heavy-footed, broad-shouldered, 
strong-bodied young woman with an honest, fierce face, 
black hair and clear eyes of uncertain color, in which 
there was more than a hint of the freedom of wild things ; 
— a woman with a keen, incisive face and a half-mannish 
beauty, asserting in overy limb and feature her conscious 
ability to take care of herself. 

His look of casual survey intensified into a gaze of slow 
scrutiny, into which in turn gradually grew an element of 
curiosity, — nothing indicative of close observation, how- 
ever, — only a little of the awakening interest one is forced 
to feel in indifferent objects which press too closely to be 
passed unobserved. His marvellous eyes, — they seemed 
never to have looked tenderly into other eyes, — regarded 
her with a slight momentary wonder, but his notice of her 
implied nothing further than an involuntary discrimina- 
tion between herself and one of an inferior race, being 
hardly more personal than a brief mood for ethnographic 
study, intended possibly to correct a mistaken meaning. 
A very superficial observation must have assured Hulse, 
however, of the present meaning of Maria Pugsley. For 
at that moment she was dominated by an anger which 
was almost a thirst for slaughter ; the look of the man 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


151 

before he -uttered a word produced on her the effect which 
the sound of battle has on an old war-horse. 

She felt herself turning pale. Her eyes were hot, her 
lips tremulous. She burst all at once into angry speech, 
resolved not to undergo the bitterness of forestallment if 
insults were to be uttered or contemptuous treatment 
endured. 

“ We-ell ! ” she cried, breaking the monosyllable in two 
and flinging the pieces into his face. “Who b Qjyou p* 

He leaned his arm leisurely against the door-post and 
looked down at her — she would not have believed that he 
was so tall — as if he were watching the movements of 
some curious insect. 

“Is Bling here? ” 

She had never heard his voice distinctly before, and it 
thrilled her. It had an indescribable vibrant power : it 
was like nervous force made audible. But she would not 
yield to its influence. She stiffened her muscles as if at 
the touch of a whip. 

“We-ell ! ” she cried in a harsh voice, like the clatter 
of fire-irons. “If ye stan’ there with yer fingers in yer 
mouth till / tell ye where Bling is, they’ll grow there ! ” 

Then it occurred to her that Hulse was not standing 
with his fingers in his mouth and that her remark must 
have sounded very flat and foolish — in short, very like a 
woman. She did not want*to appear like a woman, but 
very manly and all-subduing. She wished she could think 
of some of the fine things she had planned to say to him. 
But only one came into her head, and that was the very 
poorest of her composing. 

“Some folks is mighty satisfied with theirselves,” she 
cried sarcastically. “They ain’t nothin’ so satisfactory’s 
self-satisfaction, ’n’ a man can’t git that only at the price 
o’ ignorance.” 

Somehow that did not seem quite to suit the occasion, 


152 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


either — it sounded disconnected and premeditated. What 
if he should guess the truth that she considered him of 
sufficient importance to prepare speeches for him before- 
hand ? She was experiencing the humiliation of discover- 
ing that she was capable of being weak where she in- 
tended to be strong, and that altogether she was hovering 
dangerously close to the verge of the commonplace. She 
determined to break loose from her preconceived idea of 
herself and let her rage carry her whithersoever it would. 
That would be the best way. She pulled herself together 
and commenced bravely. 

“So ye want Bling, do ye?” she cried, standing very 
straight and trying to look down at him. “ We-ell ! Won’t 
ye come in ’n’ set down ’n’ wait in the piler till I go out ’n’ 
hunt ’im up fer ye? Ye better, ’n’ hold yer breath till I 
do ! What d’ ye take me fer, anyhow — a June-bug ’t ain’t 
ripe ? ” 

“ I don’t understand,” he said, looking at her with 
vague examination. 

“ I don’t chaw my cabbage twic’t,” she snapped. 
“Shakespeare don’t repeat ’n’ don’t ye fergit it. My 
’pinion o’ you is ’t ye’re alius askin' a heap more favers o’ 
folks ’n ye’re willin’ to let ’em ask o 'you. Ye try to work 
’em — that’s where the bug lays with you. But ye won’t 
git me to repeat what I say, .nor go a-sailin’ onto the street 
to hunt up folks fer ye, lemme tell ye that ! ” 

That was not so strongly put as she had intended it to 
be, and she had a misgiving that indications of idiocy 
might be discoverable in her, as made manifest by exu- 
berance of words and dearth of ideas. But she began 
again with desperate persistence. 

“So ye wanted to see Bling, did ye? Ye did, huh? 
Bling, huh ? Ye orter be learnt to call a gentleman Mister , 
’n’ if I’d a-had the trainin’ o’ ye I’d a-seen 't ye done it 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


1 53 

Bling, huh ? Ye orter be took acrosst somebody’s checked 
apron 'n’ paddled — that’s what ! ” 

She was better satisfied with her effort this time. It 
must make him feel very small to be talked to like a little 
boy in that way. 

But if he felt small he gave no signs of it. There was 
not a trace of emotion of any kind on his face as he 
asked : 

“ Then he isn’t here ? ” 

“ Don’t think,” she cried, raising her voice and ignor- 
ing his question, “ ’t / want none o’ yer friendship, — I’d 
scorn it if ye offered it. I ain’t one o’ the crawlin’ kind, 
/ain’t. Yer high-flyin’ ways don’t go down with me, — 
goin’ aroun’ with yer nose in the air a-sniffin’ like ye was 
a puppy ’n’ had a rat’s nest under yer nose ! Style ? I 
reckon that’s what ye call style, a-steppin’ high ’n’ lookin’ 
down on folks. But if I had sech a bilious complexion ’s 
what y ouve got, I’d go ’n’ git my liver half-soled, ’n’ not be 
tryin’ to put on airs. I won’t have ye givin’ me none o’ 
yer dirt, lem’me tell ye ! ” 

Hulse moved his hand a little way up the door-post, but 
made no sign of going ^way or otherwise altering his 
position. 

“ Do you know where he is?” he inquired in a louder 
voice, as if addressing a deaf person. 

“Do I know where he is?” mimicked Maria. “I 
reckon he’s where he b’longs, which is more ’n’ some 
folks can say o’ theirselves. Seems to me any parrotic, 
cheese-headed fool might a-seen he wan’t’erea hour ago. 
Want to set down ’n’ wait fer ’im ? Reckon I can keep 
the room comf’table warm fer ye if ye do. Come in, 
come in, ’n’ set down on the floor ’n’ be frien’ly — I feel 
jes’ like givin’ ye a song ’n’ dance the rest o’ the afternoon. 
I won’t mince matters. When I got anything to say, I 
jes’ march up square-toed ’n : say it — that’s me ! ” 


154 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


A faint expression of amusement crept into Hulse’s 
sombre face. 

“You seem a very engaging young female,” he re- 
marked. “ Dickens ought to have got hold of you.’’ 

“ The dickens ’s got a holt o 'you a’ready,” she retorted. 
“ ’N’ I bet he’s goin’ to keep his grip, too ! ” 

He bowed, and when he lifted his face she saw a look 
there which she would not have believed possible on his 
tragic features. He was smiling. She followed him out 
upon the veranda as he passed down the steps. 

“ If I was you,” she shrieked, wagging her head as she 
had often pictured herself doing, and wishing that he 
would turn so as to see how scornful she looked, “ If I 
was you I’d take to stump-speakin’ fer the nex’ ’lection. 
If ye’d jes’ turn up yer mug ’n’ empty that air smile out 
onto the public, ye could do anything with ’em ye liked.” 
She returned to the door and called back to her mother, 
loud enough for him to hear, “ Wa’n’t that fun, though, 
ma ? Didn’t I give it to ’im ? D’ye reckon I’m goin’ to 
have any sech lookin’ cubs ’s he is a-comin’ 'ere ’n’ 
warmin’ their coat-tails at my fire? Oh, Lor’, I’m ’s 
happy ’s ole boots ! ” And she commenced to sing as 
loud as she could scream : * 

“ The grasshopper sat on the railroad track, 

Sing polly-wolly-doodle all the day ! 

And he picked his teeth with a carpet tack, 

Sing polly-wolly-doodle all the day ! 

Farewell, farewell, farewell my fairy fay, 

I’m going home to see my Susiannah, 

Sing polly-wolly-doodle all the day ! ” 

Then she went into the house abruptly and took up her 
darning, but laid it down again without taking a stitch. 
Her hands trembled so that she could not control them. 
She could do nothing but laugh — she Was afraid she was 
going to cry and she would rather have died. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


155 

“Well, ye did give it to ’im,” remarked Mrs. Pugsley, 
who had been looking on with a neutral expression. 

* ‘ Great sufferin’ ! ” put in Maud Eliza. ‘ ‘ What a peelin' 
ye did give ’im ! It made my hair pull to hear ye ! ” 

“ Didn’t I give it to ’im ? ” cried Maria with wild laugh- 
ter. “Oh, ma, ma, ain’t I a pill?” 


156 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


CHAPTER XX. 

It was all Maria could do to keep back the tears. She 
was afraid they would burst forth in spite of her and make 
her appear weak and womanish when she most desired 
to appear strong and manly. To face her mother and 
sister and listen to their comments on the affair, — mostly 
of an admiring nature, it is true, but in Mrs. Pugsley’s 
case flavored with a doubt as to the propriety of such 
conduct in a girl whose mother had been a Swipes of 
Swipes’s Bar, — was a continuation of torment not long to 
be borne. She must get away at once and hide where 
she could let the tears come unhindered. She was just 
going to rush out into the woodshed as the most con- 
venient place of refuge, when she was arrested by the 
sound of voices in that direction. There was no escape. 
It was Billy and her father. She did not dare to run away 
through the front door for they would be sure to see her 
and call her back. She must stay and face it through. 

“ Lord help me ! ” she prayed to herself, hysterically. 

‘ ‘ What’ll I do — what’ll I do ? ” 

With an effort which was like a wrench to strained and 
bruised muscles she forced herself to be calm and look 
toward them as they entered. 

“Ye orter a-been ’ere!” screeched Maud Eliza, still 
agitated by the conflict. “ Mariar was that mad she 
could a-bit a ten-penny nail in two ! ” 

“ What was it ’bout ? ” asked Ephraim with a grin. 

“ It was that Hulse,” cried Maria, laughing very loudly 
while her eyes looked swollen and dry. 

“ Hulse ? ” echoed Billy, with a quick impulse of 
jealousy. “What was he doin’ ere?" 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


I 57 

“W’y,” explained Maud Eliza, interrupting herself at 
every other word with excited titters, “he come a-in- 
quirin’ fer Bling, ’ifl Mariar she got on ’er ear ’n’ give dm 
Hail Columby. Oh, my! but didn’t she pepper dm ? ” 

“ She made dm quit his funny bizness, I bet,” said 
Ephraim with admiration. 

“ I ain’t sure ’t was becomin’, though,” remarked Mrs. 
Pugsley. “ I ain’t sure ’t I'd a-done it, nohow. It 
showed she was a gal o’ sperrit, but I ain’t sure ’twas 
becomin’. A gal may go too fur. ” 

“But what was it' all ’bout?” asked Billy. “What 
d’ he do ? ” 

“ W’y,” answered Maud Eliza with a hilarious strangle, 
“ I couldn’t see ’t he was doin’ nothin’ wuss ’n’ callin’ ye 
Bling. ’N’ Mariar didn’t seem to like it. She made a 
pdnt o’ the handle — she wanted ’im to call ye Mister. She 
seems to want folks to look up to ye, Mister Bling ! ” 

Everybody laughed at this, Maria louder than the others, 
But her laugh was not mirthful ; one who listened care- 
fully might have thought it appealing. 

“ Mariar ’s the devil’s own,” said Ephraim, approvingly. 

Billy had never thought of resenting the abbreviation 
of his name, and that Maria should do so implied an in- 
terest in his dignity which was more than pleasing, and 
made him almost feel as if his value had hitherto been 
underrated. His heart began to beat rapidly, and he 
flushed all over his face and neck. Could she really have 
given Hulse a rating for such a trifle as that? Just be- 
cause she imagined the strange man had been lacking in 
respect ? It was too good to be true. He gave her a 
radiant look. 

“So ye went fer ’im o’ my ’count ? ” he asked. 

“ I wa’n’t goin’ to stan’ none o’ his airs,” she replied, 
keeping her voice steady by an effort. “He can keep 
his distance from me ’less he wants suthin’ he don’t like.” 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


I 5 8 

“Ye got away with him, then, did ye?” inquired 
Billy. 

“Ye bet she did, if she tried it,” affirmed Ephraim. 
“It’s ’most dangerous to be safe aroun’ where Mariar 
is ! ” 

“He ain’t a bad feller,” remarked Billy, generously. 
His jealousy was all gone now. 

“Taffy on a shoestring!” cried Maria. “He’s the 
nastiest, disagribblest man I ever see. ’N’ now don’t 
let’s talk no more ’bout it. I want ye to come over to 
dinner to-morrer — we’re goin’ to have a hen fun’ral ’n 
want ye fer chief mourner.” 

“’N’ apple pie,” added Mrs. Pugsley, ambiguously. 

“Not reg’lar pie,” corrected Maud Eliza. “It’s a con- 
cern to eat milk ’n’ sugar on — way up.” She nodded her 
head, smacked her lips and giggled. “Dad calls it 
apple-grunt. ” 

Billy went away presently, and as soon as he was 
out of sight Maria hurried from the house and ran to- 
ward the river, then turned and followed the current 
down stream until she was hidden by the cottonwoods 
and underbrush which grew thickly along the bank. 
When she was certain that no one could see her, she 
seated herself on a fallen tree, close up* to the water, and 
wept as only a woman can who has been denied the 
comfort of weeping when she most needed it. At first 
the sobs came thick and fast ; they mastered her, they 
shook her like impatient, hostile hands ; but gradually 
the violence of the outburst passed, and she wept those 
steady, painless tears which are the best relief of bur- 
dened minds, and which are “ salt, and bitter, and good.” 
The river at her feet moaned dismally, as if trying to 
make her feel its sorrow with her own ; and the wind 
among the branches sighed, as if telling her of its troubles, 
too. Even after the first energy of her emotion was 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


*59 


spent, she kept on weeping, not on her own account, 
but on account of the wind and the water, which craved 
her sympathy and appreciated it when she gave it. 

Presently her eyes cleared, so that she could see the 
river and the trees on the opposite bank; but even then 
there were spells when a mist would shut out everything 
for a little while, and she thrilled with a sensibility which 
found vent only in slow, helpless tears. She wept until 
she no longer felt revengeful and spiteful, until she was 
ashamed of what she had said to Hulse, and resolved in 
her soul never to be guilty of such an act again. 

That resolution did her good. It consoled her to be- 
lieve that she was capable of doing better ; it offset pro- 
spectively the abominable impression she had produced. 
She magnified that impression in all possible ways, and 
felt a fierce satisfaction in contemplating herself through 
Hulse’s eyes. With this satisfaction was mingled another 
of a different kind, namely : that she could have behaved 
herself like a lady if she had tried, and that she would 
show him in the future that she was a lady in spite of his 
just predisposition to the contrary. 

It was the first time she ever really regretted anything 
of her doing, and the regret enlightened her considerably 
concerning herself. It made her feel less absolute and 
more conditioned — a discovery which was not altogether 
pleasant in spite of the sense of enlightenment accom- 
panying it. The idea of personal value, while not exclu- 
sively a growth of Western minds, is so predominant 
among the inhabitants of those regions that many are 
inclined to regard it as indigenous to the soil. I have 
seen restaurant waiters in the mining districts of the 
Pacific Coast Region who seemed to believe that all the 
great men of the world were busy with astronomical in- 
struments vainly endeavoring to determine their altitude. 
Maria’s sudden self-distrust was significant of an ability 


l6o IN THE VALLEY OF II AVI L AH. 

to reconstruct her conceptions of herself on a firmer basis 
than that of personal estimate. She felt humble and 
docile and womanly ; she longed to begin at once on a 
course of action which should meet the approval of people 
who knew what was the right thing to approve ; she felt 
the need of being tenderer to everybody, and of having 
people think well of her ; she wanted to atone for her 
ridiculous assumptions of dignity by subduing and morti- 
fying herself in her future actions. She sat a long time 
listening to the water and looking out over the lone, level, 
far-stretching valley. 

That hour under the cottonwoods was a revelation of 
many new things concerning herself and her relations to 
her fellows. A little self-examination was what she had 
long needed. Her old standard became all at once value- 
less; she determined to look around her at once in search 
of new and better ones. It is not difficult to follow evil 
with the enthusiasm of an ideal : half the world does so 
devoutly, without knowing it. It was to Maria’s credit 
that, as soon as she discovered that she had been doing 
this all her life, she set about finding the means of restor- 
ing her confidence on a more solid foundation. 

Without knowing it herself, she had begun her conflict 
with Hulse with the intention of converting his indiffer- 
ence into admiration ; she had ended by discovering that 
his standard of measurement, while not correct in detail, — 
she was not yet prepared to admit so much as that, —was 
certainly more nearly exact than her own, and that she 
had made herself impressive only by her offensiveness. 
She had mistaken a disease for a power ; she bore no 
resemblance to the all-important, all-subduing woman 
she had supposed herself to be. She had been to blame 
for everything, even for his indifference ; it was because 
of her obvious deficiencies that he had been enabled to 
Classify her at once where she belonged. She had im 


IN THE VALLE V OF HA VI LA II. 1 6 1 

tended to impress him with perfections which he did not 
suspect ; instead of that, she had disclosed deformities 
which she might have kept concealed. She saw it all 
now — her mind passed from doubt to uncertainty in a 
slow increase of light, as she had seen the mountains 
emerge from the mist at sunrise. 

Our movements of self-exploration result in odd dis- 
coveries. It seemed to Maria that hereafter her decisions 
must be utterly valueless, torn from the fertile soil of her 
self-esteem and transplanted into the less congenial me- 
dium of self-distrust. She saw herself closed in by ever- 
narrowing horizons of ignorance, wandering forever 
helpless and — yes, aspiring. For the worst of it — or the 
best of it — was that she could never be her old self again. 
There were better things in life than she had ever dreamed 
of, though what they were she could not guess. Hulse 
knew and could tell her if he chose, but she would never 
ask him. He knew of worse things, too, she had no 
doubt, but that did not matter. 

She wished she could find out just what his idea of a 
perfect woman was. She was very humble in her new 
mood, having a vision minutely, materially distinct of 
what he thought of her, of the contempt he must feel 
for her. She pictured herself occupying a place in 
his thoughts as a creature of stupendous abilities for 
doing outrageous things, — a sort of moral ogress with 
a palate hungry for people of superior manners. She 
imagined herself so impressive in her hatefulness that 
he would go through life thinking of her every day, 
and smiling with cool criticism at her violence, which 
she had been led to believe was commendable and a sign 
of a great soul. Well, all that was now past ; but what 
could she do to redeem herself? She had no recollection 
of any woman who needed redemption. Poor Marias 
fears, when 3he thought of the future which this man had 

ii 


162 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


opened up, were somehow invariably multiples of her 
hopes. If Hulse were only a different sort of man, more 
human, more likeable, there would be no trouble in find- 
ing out what to do ; she would go directly to him and 
ask. But that was impossible. She intended never to 
look upon his face again. 

Most people are aware of love as a slow-growing 
power, like the song which smoothes itself against the 
young lark’s throat, wooing the strength to roughen it 
and prove the wisdom of its silence. It is often a sweet 
lesson conned in an idle hour and remembered as a poem 
is remembered, by rhythm and melody ; but sometimes 
it is a whirlwind which stupefies the soul to its dread 
presence, and is known forever afterward by the desola- 
tion it leaves behind. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH . 


63 


CHAPTER XXI. 

The next morning, instead of starting out with pick and 
shovel, as *his custom was, Billy found it necessary to lay 
in a supply of wood for his cabin fire. He had already 
chopped down most of the pines close to the cabin, leav- 
ing those which were high up among the rocks and near 
to the water, partly because it was inconvenient to carry 
the wood down the steep declivity, but partly also because 
he felt a fine appreciation for the concord between the 
mournful monotone of the pines and the lovelier music 
of the waterfall. He liked to listen at night to the slow 
swelling and dying away of their melody, filling the lit- 
tle canon with sad minor cadences and making . the dark- 
ness vibrate with serious sympathy. 

He shouldered his axe and went up the canon. Pres- 
ently he ascended a trail which led to the top of a 
hill on the left side of the canon. On the summit he 
paused a little to get his breath after the climb, and to look 
around him and draw in the freer air of this height. He 
was facing the west ; the far-off mountains were shrouded 
in mist ; the valley lay close and gray, and in its midst 
flowed what seemed a songless, shoreless river, sky- 
dropped and drifting outward to the sky. The moon was 
sinking slowly into the mist that hulled the western moun- 
tains. It looked like a tired, white-winged bird fluttering 
down the heavens, yet so near that Billy almost imagined 
he could reach out and take it in his hands. The sun was 
well up in the east, but as yet his warm rays had no effect 
on those far-off mists at the opposite pole of the horizon. 


1 64 IN THE VALLE V OF HA VILAH. 

“I’d like Maria to see it,” Billy thought, leaning the 
head of his ax against a rock while, he braced his elbow 
against the helve and looked around him. “She’d like 
it, I know she would. I’ll ask er to come up some 
mornin’ ’n’ take a look at it with me, or mebbe she’d like 
it better at sunset.” 

He had devoted considerable time and attention to 
speculating on Maria’s likes and dislikes, and had found 
the subject inexhaustible. He took to liking things vig- 
orously which he knew pleased her. After she told him 
how fond she was of running water, he was able to dis- 
tinguish a new melodious note in the music of the water- 
fall near his cabin. The spring song of the birds was 
pleasanter, knowing that she loved it. With this delight 
in taking up her experiences and sharing them, had come 
a keener desire to have him with her constantly, partici- 
pating in his pleasures with a measure of the sympathy 
he had for hers. All things suggested to him the sweet- 
ness of such sympathy. A flush of red light on the 
morning mist ; the slow movement of the clouds, those 
aimless daughters of the air who wander carelessly, but 
are never tired ; the frightful splendor of sunset clouds 
that seemed a-drip with blood ; everything he saw 
and heard made him wish that she were with him to talk 
about it. And, though he had never before been so sus- 
ceptible to the beauty of the world around him, had 
never been so deeply impressed with watching the 
smouldering embers of sunset die out slowly while the 
shadows folded the departing day, never had felt so 
deliciously tired and tranquil after wandering at night 
under the big, low-hanging stars, yet when he tried to 
tell her of these things he could say nothing. Words are 
at once the enemies and friends of thought ; and Billy 
found them poor helps indeed, when obliged to depend 
upon them alone for the expression of his sensibilities. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. ^5 

After a cold lunch at about one o’clock Billy put on 
his tremendous neck-tie, combed his hair carefully, and 
started to fill his dinner engagement at the Pugsleys’. 
He saw Maria in the doorway before he reached the 
cabin, and thought to himself that he had never seen her 
half so beautiful. 

As soon as she saw him she cried aloud to some one 
inside the cabin, “ W’y, here’s Billy ! ” and then came to 
the edge of the veranda to meet him. 

“We didn’t reckon ye’d be 'long so soon,” she said, 
with a look of genuine pleasure. 

“Well, I hope I ain’t too soon to be welcome,” he 
answered, laughing. 

“Hardly,” was her reply. “Ye’ll alius be welcome 
where / be. Come in, come in, ’n’ set down.” 

Billy entered the cabin, taking off his hat as he did so. 
Maria pushed a bench toward him, — one of several which 
she had induced her father to knock together as substi- 
tutes for chairs, — and repeated her invitation to be seated. 
Then she took his hat, after a faint resistance on his part, 
and hung it up on a nail by the window. 

“There ! ” she said, with friendly triumph, “ye wasn’t 
a-goin’ to give it to me, was ye ? ” 

“W’y, I don’t want to make no trouble,” he answered. 
“ The floor’s good ’nough fer my hat, ’n’ if ’tain’t, I can 
wait on myself. How d’ye find yerself to-day, Mis’ 
Pugsley ? Better, I hope ? ” 

Mrs. Pugsley adjusted her crinoline with ostentatious 
nicety, and raised herself a little way on her blankets with 
as much effort for effect as if she had been posing for 
Venus rising from the sea. 

“Yes, I reckon I may say I’m better, young man,” she 
replied with dignity. “ ’N’ I ain’t got no call to say I 
ain’t glad ’n’ proud when I’m asked how I be, even if I 
never hope to say I’m well ; ’11’ we’re very glad o’ yer 


1 66 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


comp’ny to dinner, Mr. Bling. ? N’ I’ve spoke fer the 
gizzard, which is my fav’rite.” 

After making this last statement in a solemn and official 
manner, she settled back and assumed a more conversa- 
tional tone. 

“ We didn’t git up till eight o’clock this mornin’, V 
seems to me like they ain’t been no time to do nothin’ all 
day long. I’ve jes’ been layin’ here ’n’ thinkin’ ’t Mariar 
orter a-got up earlier when she knowed we was goin’ to 
have comp’ny like this ’ere. She’s had to fly to git things 
ready, I tell ye. I ain’t sure ’t the vittles ’ll be done the 
way they orter be, nohow ; but I can’t help it, stretched 
out ’ere the way I be with the pains a-jumpin’ through me. 
She orter a-got up earlier, I should say. I’m afeerd she’s 
a-gittin’ pompered with lux’ry.” 

“Well, I don’t b’lieve in settin’ up all night so’s to be 
sure o’ bein’ up in the mornin’,” said Maria. 

“Nor I,” said Billy. “My mornin’ snooze ’s the best 
part o’ my sleep. Ain’t yer dad nowheres aroun’ ? I 
’spected he’d be ’ere, sure.” 

“Oh, he’ll be on hand fer the chicken, ye can go 
a-gamblin’ o’ that.” Maria’s resolution to be good had 
not yet produced a reform in her language, and she was 
as slangy as ever. “He likes chicken equal to a preacher. 
He’s hangin’ aroun’ the saloons, I reckon, same as usual. 
He never got treated so much nowheres afore.” 

A conscious look must have crept into Billy’s face for 
she cried out immediately : 

“ I bet ye’ve been a-givin’ ’im money ! ” 

He did not answer, but his looks spoke plainly enough 
for him. 

“ Have ye, now?” she insisted. 

He laughed rather sheepishly. 

“ Well, they ain’t no use denyin’ it as I know of,” he 
said. “ I give ’im a couple o’ dollars day afore yisterday 


JAT THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 1 67 

jes’ fer luck. I heerd ye say as he was better nater'd 
when he had a drop or two to keep ’im up.” 

“ So he is — so he is. Lor’, I told ’im only this mornin’ 
’t if he could smell his own breath it 'ud save him two 
bits every time he opened his mouth. ’N’ there ye was 
at the bottom o’ it ! * 

“ I hope ye don’t mind ? ” said Billy, anxiously. 

“ Mind? oh, no ; I don’t mind. All I mind ’bout is his 
gittin’ too much ’n’ commencin’ his howlin’. He’s awful 
then. ” 

“ He seems to think a heap o’ his fam’ly,” remarked 
Billy. 

“ Oh, yes, he does. 1 reckon they ain’t no man no- 
wheres 't’s prouder o’ his wife ’n’ gals ’n what dad is. At 
the same time he don’t seem to have no idee o’ doin’ 
nothin’ fer us. He likes us fust rate, but he likes doin’ 
nothin’ a deal sight better. ” 

“ Oh, well, I reckon it’s a habit,” said Billy with in- 
dulgence. 

“ Yes, it’s a habit — that’s jes’ it, ’n’ a mighty bad one, 
too. It’s a habit. If it was a accident I could overlook 
it easier. It’s one thing to step into the mud absent- 
minded like, but it’s ’nother to stan’ there shif’less till it 
dries ’n’ holds ye fast.” 

Billy laughed. 

“ Ye’re ruther hard on yer dad,” he said. “ ’N’ that’s 
nat’ral, bein’ ’t ye’re so dif’rent yerself.” 

“Well, I ain’t much like ’im, ’n’ that’s a fack. I 
d’ know ’s I’m like nobody. Ma says they ain’t no Swipes 
in me, so I d’ know who or what I be.” 

“ She cert’nly ain’t no Swipes,” affirmed the moist 
woman. “ Not half the Swipes ’t Maud Elizy is.” 

“ Talkin’ o’ Maud Elizy sets me a-wonderin' where 
she’s likely to be,” said Maria. “ Traipsin’ ’n’ trollopin’ 


1 68 IN the VALLE V OF HA VLLAH. 

the camp, I reckon, ’s usual. She orter be slapped ’n’ 
shet up in the woodshed/’ 

“ Why, Mariar,” put in her mother in a reproachful 
tone, “ the gal mus’ have a little fun wunst in a while. 
She ain’t like what you be ; ye don’t seem to understan' 
’er. ” 

“ She ain’t too deep fer common folks to understan’, 
nohow,” declared Maria. 

“ She’s all Swipes, Maud Elizy is,” pursued the old 
woman without noticing the interruption, “ ’n’ somehow 
ye never seem to see jes’ what that is. The Swipes’ nater 
goes beyond ye. Maud Elizy ’s all fer laffin’ ’n’ takin’ on 
’n’ havin’ a good time. She’s jes’ like I was, her age — 
jes’ zackly. ’N’ if she don’t git out ’n’ rustle ’roun’ ’n’ 
ketch a man fer ’erself, I’d like to know who’s a-goin’ to 
do it fer ’er ? I can’t, laid up here with my sides a-splittin’ 
off o’ me. ’N’ if she was lik ejyou ’n’ treated all the fellers 
the way ye did that Hulse yisterday, I’d like to know 
where her chances ’ud be ? ” 

Maria flushed scarlet. 

“ Hulse is dif’rent from the rest o’ ’em,” she said, in 
weak justification. 

“ I reckon ye made ’im feel sick,” cried Billy in a tone 
of glee. ’ “ He alius has his nose in the air, though he 
don’t seem to know it, ’n’ it ’ll do ’im good to have it 
lowered.” 

“ Oh, I d’ know,” replied Maria in an altered voice. 
“ I’m ruther ’shamed o’ what I done. I hadn’t got no 
call to ack so. ” 

“ He’s a queer-lookin’ critter,” remarked Mrs. Pugsley. 
“ The las’ one I’d want fer a son-in-law if I had any 
choosin’ in the bizness. I wouldn’t know how to git 
aroun’ sech a man. I couldn’t tell whether I’d reely got 
’im or not. ” 

“ Prob’Iy some wooman’s give’im the shake some time 


W THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 169 

or other,” said Maria, still flushing. “ I’ve heerd how 
that makes some men queer in their heads. Don’t that 
air chicken smell good, though, a-boilin’ ’n’ a-steamin’ ? 
I like the smell o’ it ’mos’ ’s well ’s I do the taste.” 

“Ye may have the smell if ye like,” returned Mrs. 
Pugsley, solemnly. “ But I’ll take the gizzard fer mine, 
every time. I wonder why chickens wa’n’t made all 
gizzard, Mariar ? I’m sure they’d a-been a heap better 
feedin’.” 


170 


IN THE VALLE Y OF HA VILAH. 


CHAPTER XXII. 

“ We might go out V set on the verandy steps, I 
should think, ’’ said Billy after a little while. “ Ye won't 
have to fix the table fer some time yit, 'n' the pertaters 'n' 
chicken 'll keep on bilin’ ’thout our stayin’ in here. 'N' 
ain't it ruther warm, spite o’ the door bein' open ? " 

“ Well, mebbe 'tis. I like it better in the air, anyhow. 
The river sounds plainer out there." 

She went to the stove and lifted the tin pan which 
served as lid to the kettle in which the chicken was 
boiling, and gazed in with housewifely solicitude, giving 
the contents a thoughtful poke or two with her steel fork, 
then followed him out upon the veranda with the fork still 
in her hand. 

“ It's awful pleasant to have the river so near,” she 
said, seating herself at his side. “I never git tired o’ it, 
day nor night. ” 

“Yes. Sence ye spoke to me 'bout it I’ve had the 
same feelin’ fer the water up there to my place. When I 
wake up in the night, the sound o’ it seems sort o’ 
friendly." 

“ I warrant it does," said Maria. “ 'N' it’s a kind o’ 
friendship a body don’t git tired of. That’s the test o’ 
friendship — when it lasts 'thout makin' a feller tired." 

“ I hope ye ain’t in the habit o’ gettin’ tired o’ yer 
friends ? ” said Billy. 

“ No, I don’t reckon I be. But they’s lots o’ folks ’t a 
body seems to git sick of purty quick. They don’t last,— 
familiarity wears ’em thin in less ’n’ no time. Ye know 


IN THE VALLE V OF HA VILAH. 


171 

what I mean, — it gits to be a trouble, fearin’ 't they may 
tear into rags if ye touch em ’n’ nothin’ be left but a few 
scraps here ’n’ there to reproach ye.” 

“ Yes, I’ve seen that sort o’ folks.” 

N’ they’s some t has sech a heap o’ meanness in ’em 
V yit manage to cover it up so ’t ye don’t s’pect, — any- 
ways fer a long time. They ain’t no tellin’ what they be 
from what they say ’n’ do. I hate that wuss 'n anything. - 
It’s like ye can’t jedge by the jinglin’ how much money 
they is in a man’s pocket. More likely ’n not he’s got a 
lot o’ keys or suthin’ in there ’t makes the noise . ” 

“ That’s so,” said Billy, with an emphatic nod. 

“ I hate fuss ’n’ make-believe,” continued Maria. 
“ The man ’t makes the biggest splashin’ in the wash- 
basin don’t alius come out with the cleanest face. I like 
folks to show right out plain what they be, ’n’ then I know 
how to take ’em. ” 

“ It’s a wicked world,” remarked Billy, vaguely, dis- 
cerning that Maria was in a pessimistic mood, and that 
she expected him to share it with her. 

“ Yes, a wicked world, ’’she repeated, stabbing her fork 
into the wooden step and drawing it out with a wrench. 
“ ’N’ sometimes it seems to me like I’m the very wickedest 
critter a-runnin’ in it.” 

“ Oh, Lor’, no,” replied Billy, not prepared to go into 
extremes in that rash way. “ You wicked ! what a idee ! ’ 

“ Oh, ye d’ know me,” declared Maria, stabbing her 
fork into the step repeatedly. “Ye think I’m good, but 
ye d’ know me. Dad’s right when he calls me a terror. 

I am a terror — I’m ies’ what he says — I’m the Devil’s 
Own.” 

“ That’s all stuff,” said Billy, in a tone of conviction, 
“/say ye’re the best woman I ever seen, — I won’t even 
except my mother. ’N’ she’s in heaven, if they’s a place 
fer good folks to go to when they’re dead.’’ 


172 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


11 Ye d’ know me,” she repeated, gloomily. “ I’m a 
terror, — I’m a terror to the world ! ” 

Billy glanced at her with shy insistence. 

“ Anyhow, ye’re good hiough fer me” he said. 

She did not seem to hear him. 

“ All the trouble V bother I ever had ’s jes’ come from 
my bein’ sech a case.” 

“ Oh, shucks!” said Billy, sympathetic but unbeliev- 
ing. 

“ Well, it’s so, anyhow,” she affirmed. “ I am a case. 

’N’ it’s been a-worryin’ me a good deal lately. I didn’t- 
sleep good las’ night fer thinkin’ o’ it.” 

“ Fer thinkin’ o’ yer wickedness ?” said Billy with a 
laugh. ** Oh, Lor’ ! ” < 

“ Well, I didn’t sleep, anyhow, ’n’ ye may laugh s 
much ’s ye like. But it’s no laughin’ matter. ” c 

“ I won’t laugh no more, then.” 1 

They sat for some time, and he did not attempt to dis- 
turb her. She was looking out toward the river, where | 
the water flashed in the sun as it slipped between the 1 
scarred trunks of the cottonwoods. She held her fork in 
both hands now, and her arms were resting rigidly on 
her knees. All at once she turned toward him and spoke 
in an abrupt, earnest tone : 

“ I’ve been thinkin’ what I mus’ do to make abetter 
wooman out o’ myself, Billy. I want to be a bette* 
wooman.” 

« 

Billy looked at her as puzzled as trying to follow her in 
a course of abstract reasoning. That she should want to 
be better was little short of incomprehensible. Was she * 
not the best and most beautiful being in the world 
naturally and without any effort of her own ? And did 
not everybody recognize her as such who came near her? 
The idea that she was wicked was absurd. He could not 
locate her except as an incarnate perfection. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


1 73 


“ W’y, Mariar — ” he began. 

But she interrupted him before he could go further. 

“I want to be better, ’’she repeated, seriously, with 
her eyes fixed again on the gliding river. “ I want to be 
more like reel wimmin, — I want to know things. Lor’, I 
d’ know nothin’, / don’t.” 

“Ye know loads more ’n some folks ’t purtend to be 
smarter,” said Billy. She seemed far enough away from 
him now in the fulness of her strength and beauty ; what 
would she be if the wisdom of books were added to her 
natural advantages ? “ D’ye mean ye’re goin’ to take to 

readin’ books, then ? ” 

“ I thought o’ it las’ night when I was layin’ awake,” 
she said, still more seriously. “ But I ain’t sure ’t that’s 
what I want, — I ain’t sure o’ nothin’. D’ye reckon all 
them fine wimmin down to ’Frisco knows how to read? ” 

“ I reckon they do.” 

“ It come into my head ’t it might be a good thing to 
know books in that permis’cus way ’t ye could pick one 
up anywheres hi’ read it ’thout stoppin’ to spell out the 
words. They mus’ be a heap in ’em if a feller only 
knowed how to git it out. I used to read the Bible a 
little, but I didn’t seem to enjoy it much. I had one ’t 
Maud Elizy stole wunst when we was little gals ’n’ went 
into a church in San Jose while a feller was sweepin’ out. 
They was lots o’ Bibles ’n’ hymn books ’n’ sech layin’ 
aroun’ on the seats, ’n’ she chucked one under ’er apern 
’n’ carried it off. I reckon if I could read the Bible right 
along easy, I might git a right smart o’ good out o’ it. 
But it was hard to spell through the words.” 

“ I ’member my mother used to read in the Bible,” said 
Billy. “ She done it every evenin’, reg’lar. She’d draw 
’er chair up to the table where the candles was 'n* read 
there a hour to a time, jes’ ’s peaceful ’n’ quiet. I can 
^member how good she alius lot)ked, a-sittin’ so.” 


74 


IN THE VALLEY OF II A VI L AH 


“ She could read right off, couldn’t she ? ” 

“ Oh, yes.” 

“ I shouldn’t wonder if that was jes’ what I wanted. 
I’ve lost my Bible now — the one what Maud Elizy stole. 
I d’ know what’s become o’ it. I reckon it tumbled out o’ 
the waggin som’ers when we was on the go. But they’s 
newspapers. I reckon a feller could use newspapers.” 
Poor Maria’s ideas of the means employed in being good 
were full of the hazy indistinctness which characterizes a 
broad landscape. 

“ Hulse might lend ye some o’ his books,” said Billy, 
with a touch of bitterness. 

Maria flushed. Did Billy, in a measure, suspect the 
truth ? She was inclined to believe so, and resented his 
penetration as an intrusion into the privacy of her own 
soul. But she did not dare to give utterance to her 
resentment ; it would testify to the truthfulness of his 
suspicions. 

“ I don’t want none o’ his books,” she said, trying to 
speak naturally and succeeding to a degree that surprised 
herself. “ I wouldn’t ask ’im fer ’em, nohow. ’N’, sides 
that, I doubt if I could understan’ ’em if I had ’em.” 

“ Well, I have my doubts ’bout all books ’ceptin’ the 
Bible,” said Billy. “ The Bible ’s all right, but ye can’t 
never tell ’bout the others.” 

“ Then ye wouldn’t try it, if ye was me? ” 

“No, I wouldn't.” 

She looked at him thoughtfully. 

“ Then I reckon I won’t,” she said. 

Billy beamed. 

“ Hulse’s books ain’t made ’im no happier nor better,” 
he said. “ It’s my ’pinion ye’re jes’ ’s well off a-lettin’ 
that air truck alone.’’ 

She was silent awhile and did not look at him, but he 
felt somehow uncomfortable, as if she were on the point 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


175 


of saying something severe but were suppressing the 
inclination. He wished he had not spoken quite so posi- 
tively ; what right had he to tell her that she would better 
let that truck alone ? If she should burst forth with an 
angry retort, how could he answer her ? 

“ Hulse might be a heap unhappier if he didn’t have 
his books,” she responded, and her voice trembled a little, 
though not with anger. “ ’N’ how do I know how much 
I’m missin’ by not bein’ able to read, too ? It’s a awful 
bother to learn, I hain’t no doubt, but when a feller got 
so ’t he could do it fast, why — they mus' be suthin’ in it, 
or else why do all the preachers ’n’ other good folks read 
so much ? ” 

She stabbed her fork into the step again and broke off 
a splinter of the light pine. 

“Well,” said Billy, yielding as his habit was, “they 
ain’t no den yin’ ’t they’s a heap in knowin’ things ’t ’s to 
be knowed. I’m often s’prised at things I d’ know nothin' 
’bout. ” 

“ I ain’t never s’prised at things I d’ know nothin’ 
’bout,” she answered. “ I’m used to that. But I’m 
frekently s’prised at things I do know. I ain’t quite a 
fool, if I don’t know nothin’ ’bout book-learnin’. ’N’ I 
ain’t a-goin’ to say ’t lots o’ things I know ain’t more use- 
ful ’n what the gals down to ’Frisco learn ’t go to school 
in them big buildin’s. Lor’, I’ve heerd tell o’ their say- 
in’s, sometimes, ’n’ seems to me like they mus’ be awful 
sawneys. Mebbe if I’d take to learnin’ I’d git like that. 
Mebbe they’s some sort o' danger, like, in books ’t a 
feller ’d have to look out fer. Mebbe they’re suthin’ like 
spectacles — they help or hinder the sight, ’n’ it can’t be 
said aforehand which they’re goin’ to do.” 

Billy smiled at her earnestness and shook his head. 

“ Fust ye’re all fer books, a body ’d think, 'n’then ye’re 


1 76 IN THE VALLE Y OF HA VILAH 

all agin 'em. It’s sort o’ hard to make out jes’ what ye 
mean. ” 

She smiled back at him with a measure of her customary 
brightness. 

“ Well, don’t try, then. It’s ’nough fer us 't were good 
friends, ain’t it, even if we don’t alius see clean through 
each other? ’N’ we air good friends, Billy,” she cried,' 
cordially. “ We’ve been so ever sence we met, 'n' we’re 
goin’ to keep right on, ain’t we ? It needn’t bother us ’t 
we’re sometimes puzzled at each other. Lor’, I don’t 
reckon ’t most o’ us see through ourselves clear, let alone 
other folks. We say we see the sky, but what do we 
know o’ its depths ’n’ bounds ? ” 

Her return to a tone of confidence and friendship caused 
a thrill of warmth in Billy’s heart. His voice trembled a 
little with suppressed eagerness as he spoke after a little 
preparatory pause. 

“ We may not know very much o’ ourselves, as ye say, 
but they’s one thing ’t I could alius be sure of, no matter 
what else I couldn’t see plain : if I loved a wooman I’d 
know it, ’n' I’d love 'er honest ’n’ true.” He knew that 
this rapid particularization might prove disastrous, — he 
was never at all certain of the manner in which she would 
receive his advances, — but he could not restrain himself. 
The words had a life of their own and would not be held 
back. Anyway her avowal of friendship gave him some- 
thing like a right to be distinctive and descriptive in 
speaking of himself. 

She examined her fork with assiduous attention. 

“ I should think anybody ’d know when they was in 
love,” she said, pressing the tines together and then let- 
ing them fly apart. “ I’m sure I shall. I don't reckon 
I’ll be backward ’bout cornin’ forrard 'n’ lettin’it be known, 
nuther. I don’t flatter myself I m over bashful. Lor', 
there’s Maud Elizy ’n’ dad cornin’ with their noses up 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


1 77 

a-smellin’ that chicken afar off. Didn’t I tell ye they’d be 
here in time ? I mus’ go in ’n’see to things.” 

Maud Elizy went around to the woodshed and Ephraim 
came up to Billy, grinning. His life may be described 
as one long, unsightly grin. Even the variation of what 
he was pleased to call a “’casional little debauch” did 
not effectually break the monotony of his grimaces. 


12 


178 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


CHAPTER XXIII. 

Maria remained standing at Billy’s side till her father 
came up. Her eyes were roaming absently, and she 
seemed touched by a slow appreciation of the magnificent 
landscape. 

“ It’s a day straggled from heaven, ain’t it?” she said. 
“ It’ll be this way right along, now, I reckon. It gives 
a body a relief o’ mind when the rainy season ’s reely 
over, don’t it ? It makes me feel like I was beginnin’ 
everything over agin. ” 

She let her gaze rest a moment on the distant moun- 
tains, above which the heaped white clouds rose like ice- 
bergs that rest a little before a current comes and bears 
them away. Then she sighed unconsciously and went 
into the house. 

Ephraim sat down in her place and Billy talked to 
him in an aimless fashion, listening all the time to the 
sound of Maria’s footsteps within Now she was going 
to the cupboard for something : now she was lifting the 
pan from the kettle and poking the steaming contents, as 
he had seen her do before she came out with him upon 
the veranda ; now she was going into the woodshed for 
wood. He heard the clatter of the sticks as she flung 
them down by the stove when she came back into the 
room, and presently she returned to the door and spoke 
to her father. 

“ Ye’ll have to come ’n’ split some more wood, dad,” 
she said. “ That’s all gone ’t ye split las’ night.” 

“ Lem’me go ’n’ do it, ’ said Billy, as Ephraim rose to 
obey her. 


IN THE VALLE V OF HA VILAH 


179 


But Maria would not hear of that, and pushed him play- 
fully back into his seat. He was an invited guest to-day, 
and must do nothing like work while he was there in that 
capacity. 

“ I used to be a dandy at wood-splitting” she said. 
“ But I don’t do it no more ’nless I have to. I chopped 
my toe wunst with the axe ’n’ that made me kind o’shy.” 

“ Did it hurt the axe ? ” asked Billy, gravely. 

“ Oh, ye silly ! ” she laughed, shaking her fork at him 
and re-entering the house. 

After a while she shouted to him that dinner was ready, 
and he had the honor of assisting Mrs. Pugsley to rise 
from her blankets — a performance which the moist woman 
accomplished with a great deal of groaning and ostenta- 
tious management of crinoline. 

When they were seated at table and Maria was pouring 
the coffee, she said : 

“ Well, dad, where ye been all afternoon? We missed 
yer gentle cackle ’n’ Billy was ’quirin’ fer ye.” 

“ Oh, I was ’roun’ camp,” replied Ephraim. 

“ Lookin’ under yer little finger ?’’ inquired Maria. 

Ephraim grinned. 

‘•'Well, fer the sake o’ argyment, we’ll say I was lookin’ 
under my little finger. Boosey sells a mighty good bran’ 
o’ whiskey fer this part o’ the country.” 

“Well, dish up the chicken ’n’ don’t set there a-grinnin’. 
Don’t ye see ma’s waitin’ fer the gizzard ? Pass yer dish, 
ma, quick ! I’m goin’ to see ’t ye’re waited on fust.” 

But the moist woman seemed to have been seized by a 
sudden spasm of humanity and settled back in her seat, 
shaking her head mournfully. 

“ Don’t quar’l ’bout me,” she said. “ I hate quar’lin’. 
’Sides, I ain’t nobody to quar’l ’n’ fight over. If anybody 
wants the gizzard they can have it. I ain’t got no right 
to it if they’s anybody else ’t feels the need o’ it.” 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


180 

“ Oh, Lor’, ma,” cried Maria, heartily, “pass yer plate 
’n’ don’t jaw. Don’t ye see dad’s waitin’ ?” 

“ Mebbe Mr. Bling ’ud like it,” said Mrs. Pugsley in a 
fatal tone. 

“Oh, no!” cried Billy. “I’d alius ruther have a leg ! ” 

“ Maud Elizy’s fond o’ the gizzard, I know,” quavered 
Mrs. Pugsley. “ Let ’er have it, Ephraim. I ain’t 
a-goin’ to quar’l. Nobody shall have it to say o’ me 
when I’m dead ’t I wa’n’t a good mother to my own flesh 
’n’ blood.” 

“ I don’t want it,” declared Maud Eliza. “ I’m goin’ 
to have the wish-bone ’n’ stick it up over the door.” 

“ Mariar wants it then,” said Mrs. Pugsley. 

“ No, no!” affirmed Maria. 

“Well, I know Ephraim does. Take it, Ephraim, dear. 
I’ve been a good wife to ye ’n’ alius will be. Gimme the 
backbone ’n’ the ribs, or the neck. They’re ’s good ’s I 
deserve. ” 

She passed her plate, looking out of the window and 
wiping her eyes while he helped her. After he had 
finished she did not look down at her plate for some time, 
and when at last she did so it was with the unwilling air 
of one who has postponed as long as possible a bitter 
draught of medicine which must be taken. 

“ W’y, ye gimme the gizzard, Ephraim!” she cried. 
Then, with tearful meekness, “Thankee, dear!’’ 

She wiped her eyes pathetically and cut off a bit and 
tasted it. 

“ I don’t see w’y the hull animal couldn’t a-been giz- 
zard,” she said, more hopefully after discovering the 
coveted morsel on her plate. “ ’N’ then they could be 
none o’ this ’ere fussin’ ’n’ quar’lin’. ” 

“ Lor’,” cried Maria, merrily, “ if ’twas all gizzard ye’d 
be a-gettin’ so fat ye couldn’t see over yerself, ma. I 
wonder the hull o’ us ain’t in that fix with all the good 


IN THE VALLE Y OF HA VILAH. 1 8 1 

things we’ve been a-feastin’ on lately. Have some o’ the 
gravy on yer pertater, Billy. Ye like chicken gravy, I 
hope ? ” 

‘'Well, -I should say I did!” declared Billy. “Ain’t 
it yer own make ? ” 

“ Pooh ! that ain’t no reason fer likin’ it. Maud Elizy, 
set the salt where he can run his knife into it ’n’ git what 
he wants. ’N’ the bread’s too fur away, — shove it over 
into the middle o’ the table ’n’ make yerself useful. Billy 
mus’ git all he can carry, fer wunst. He bought it, ’n’ a 
man mus’ suffer the consequence o’ his piety.” 

“ Great piety, that!” cried Billy, between mouthfuls. 

“Well, call it charity, then. We’re a ragged lot, we 
air, but I d’ know where we’d be if it wa’n’t fer your doin’ 
fer us. We never was quite so low down afore, seems to 
me. They’s lots o’ folks ’t can easier drop a tear ’n’ a 
penny, but you ain’t that sort, I’ll go bail to say. Look 
at Maud Elizy ! Don’t she bear down on that wish-bone 
heavy ? ” 

Maud Eliza was too busy to answer more definitely 
than by a smothered titter. 

“ Don’t she come right down on it with both feet?” 
continued Maria with mock admiration. “ Ain’t she 
courageous to tackle it single-handed like that?” 

“ Oh, yes, ole funny !” said Maud Eliza, compelled to 
some more specific form of articulation. 

“Well, I’m glad we don’t live in the city, anyhow,” 
said Maria, glancing out of the window and changing the 
subject at sight of the free sky and glad sunshine. “ I 
never did live there, ’n’ I never ’tend to. It makes a body 
feel like you wa’n’t nothin’ ’t all. Here ye can git yer 
breath ’n’ spread yerself over ’s much groun’ ’s ye like, 
but there a man’s life ain’t no more count ’n a red ant’s is 
in the country. That makes a feller feel so little ’n’mean.” 

“But they ’s more style there,” said Mrs. Pugsley, 


1 82 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


rousing herself and speaking with interest. “ Ye can git 
the latest things cheap in them second-hand stores on 
Fourth Street. I went in ’n’ looked aroun. ,, 

“ They’s orfle deceitful folks in them cities,” remarked 
Ephraim, gnawing a bone and speaking wi,th an air of 
paternal wisdom. “ I doubt if it’s good to raise a fam’ly 
o’ gals in these ’ere towns.’” 

“ I hate deceitful people,” affirmed Maria, who always 
had a great deal to say on this subject. “ ’N’ that’s one 
reason why I wouldn’t like to live in a town. A feller 
never d’ know what or who folks was. Seems like the 
proper caper there ’s to let on ’t ye’re suthin’ ’t ye reely 
ain’t; that’s city folks’ stronghold. I say the strongest 
man ’s the one ’t ’s strong ’nough jes to be hisself ’n’ 
nothin’ else. It’s all right to mistake mica fer gold in the 
sands o’ the river, ’n’ sech. Nater don’t seem to know no 
better sometimes ’n’ to seem what she ain’t ; but folks 
orter know better. I hate a man ’t ’ll go ’roun’ with the 
demure, pious look o’ a Mexican mule, ’n’ all to wunst 
kick out behind ’n’ send ye flying sky-high. They’re a 
crafty lot, them city fellers. They’s lots o’ ’em whose 
only honor is their aptness at lyin’, ’n’ yit they’d make 
ye think they was heavenly churribs, they’ve got that 
mount o’ cheek. Excuse me from them, please,” she 
finished, with a show of elaborate politeness. 

Billy laughed. 

“I hate deceitful folks, too,” he said. 

“Lor’ yes. Have ’nother pertater. They’s plenty 
more in the kittle.” 

“No more pertaters, thankee.” 

“Well, ’nother chunk o’ the chicken, then. Dad, ain’t 
that a wing over there to the fur end o’ the dish? Give 
’im that. Ye like the wing, don’t ye?” 

“Yes, it’s a wing,” said Maud Eliza, peering into the 
dish and identifying the morsel by lifting it half-way out 


IN THE VALLE Y OF HA VILAH. x 83 

of the gravy with her fork. ‘ ‘ I had the other one after I 
finished the wish-bone.” 

“ Pass yer plate, then, Billy. Dad, give ’im the wing/’ 

“Well, if it is a wing — ” said Billy, lifting his plate. 

But at this juncture- an almost tragic interruption oc- 
curred. Mrs. Pugsley, whose fluctuations ‘of humility 
and arrogance could never be calculated beforehand, 
suddenly dropped her blasted-by-disappointment air and 
spoke with unexpected authority. 

“ Ephraim, /II take the wing ! ” she cried^ thrusting her 
plate in front of Billy’s with a regal movement. 

There was a moment of painful silence. 

“Why, ma ! ” cried Maria, taken by surprise and unable 
to grapple with the difficulties of the situation. 

“I’ll take the wing,” repeated Mrs. Pugsley in an awful 
tone, tilting her plate from side to side impatiently. “I 
reckon I’m in my own house ’n’ at my own table hi’ have 
a right to say suthi’n ’bout what’s to go into my own in- 
sides ! ” 

“But Billy paid for it,” said Maria, faintly. 

Billy had replaced his plate on the table in front of him 
and was laughing good-naturedly. 

“ Oh, let ’er have it, ” he said, without a trace of the 
embarrassment Maria expected him to show. ‘ * I’d ruther 
have the other leg, anyhow. I didn’t see it was there 
when I said I’d take the wing. ” 

Maria gave him a grateful look. 

“ Ye’re the best natered feller I ever see,” she said, with 
something like enthusiasm. “Lor’, yer mustn’t mind 
ma. She ain’t well, ye know.” 

Billy flushed blissfully. 

“Oh, I know,” he said. 

“My health wa’n’t never better,” asserted the moist 
woman, gnawing her wing defiantly. “Ye needn’t try 
to make a case out o’ that, Marlar. ’N’ I reckon a woo- 


1 84 IN THE VALLE V OF HA VLLAH. 

man has a right to her say-so wunst in a while in her own 
house V to her own table, sick or well. ” 

Maria did not carry the subject farther, and while they 
were eating their dessert, — the “ apple grunt ” which Maud 
Eliza had eulogized the day before — Maria said : 

“ I’m goin’ to leave the dishes fer ye to do all by yer- 
self this time, Maud Eliza. I got every speck o’ the din- 
ner ’n’ it’s only fair. I want to git out into the fresh air 
V take a walk. Ye’ll go with me, won’t ye, Billy? 
It’ll be better ’n stayin’ cooped up in the house.” 

“Lor’, yes, I’ll go,” replied Billy, eagerly. 

So when the meal was ended they started out together 
in that state of serenity which succeeds a comfortable 
dinner and puts one at peace with one’s self and all the 
world. The exalted state of the human mind the world 
over is intimately connected with the comfortable fulness 
of a reliable stomach. 


IN THE VALLEY OF H AVILA H. 


185 


CHAPTER XXIV. 

The clouds, more like icebergs than ever, were floating 
southward beyond the mountains as if the current had 
come which was to bear them onward; the rest of the 
sky was brilliantly blue and clear. Billy and Maria went 
directly to the river’s bank, then turned and walked down 
stream. 

When they came to the log where Maria had indulged 
in her fit of weeping, she sat down again as naturally as 
if from long habit, and Billy took his place at her side. 
That spot was destined to be the scene of some of the 
most tragic events of their lives. 

Marias eyes were bright, her cheeks were glowing. 
One might have discovered in her strong young woman- 
hood an impersonation of all the beneficent powers of 
earth and air, — free winds, clear waters, wholesome 
natural noises somehow transformed into good flesh and 
blood and ruled by honest human impulses. To Billy 
she was more than that, — she was the woman he loved. 
He sat at her side contentedly, a willing example of the 
natural dominion of woman over man. 

As for Maria, her thoughts were running on her recent 
resolve to be a good woman and calculating how it was 
possible to bring that miracle about. Her old rules of 
conduct had fallen away from her suddenly, mysterious- 
ly, and left her stupid and staring as if at the vanishing 
of a group of well-known people in broad daylight. This 
interval of stunned uncertainty was likely to admit of 
some surprising actions on her part. 


1 86 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


She sat for some moments watching the slow, grave 
movement of the clouds and listening to the murmurous 
sound of the water. The noise made her sad and dreamy ; 
it always seemed trying to bear her away from herself 
into far distant lands where the world was brighter and 
life was a thing to be enjoyed in beautiful, indefinite ways. 
She forgot the river, the clouds, the sunshine. Her face 
grew as far away in its expression as were her thoughts. 
If she was thinking at all, she did not know it. Yet she 
had the wrapt look of one who listens to inward music. 

Billy’s voice broke in upon her suddenly. 

“W’y, what in the world be ye thinkin’ of ? ” he cried. 
“ Ye seemed gone ’way-off, like. Was ye dreamin’ ? ” 

The interruption annoyed her but she laughed. 

1 ‘ I reckon I must a-been, ” she said. ‘ ‘ ’N’ mighty hard, 
too, for I’d clean fergot where I was. ” She looked out 
once more at the free expanse of plain and mountain 
without seeming to see them. 

She took off her bonnet and let it fall upon the ground 
at her side and then sat staring down at it in* an absent 
way. Suddenly she turned to Billy and said : 

“Soyer mother was a religious wooman, was she? 
She must a-been, to read ’er Bible so regular. ” 

“Yes, she was religious, — one o’ the best wimmin ’t 
God ever made.” 

“She was better off with ’er religion ’n she’d a-been 
’thout, it I make no doubt.” 

“She alius took great comfort in it, I know.” 

“ D’ye reckon a feller could git religion ’thout goin’ to 
all the bother o’ learnin’ to read ? ” 

“Lor’, yes, I’ve seen em, back there in Ohio.” 

“ I reckon I better git religion, then,” said Maria, 
rapidly. She made an absent movement to pick up her 
bonnet, but left it lying. “ Mebbe that ’s what I need — 
it mus’ be, if it makes folks better ; ’n’ then, it couldn’t be 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


1 87 

much trouble if a feller didn’t stop to read. I need to be 
better, Billy ; ’n’ Pd like to git religion if it ’ud help me to 
behave myself.” 

Billy smiled, but as soon as he caught sight of her face 
he became serious. 

“ W’y, ye’re in earnest ! ” he said. 

“O' course I’m in earnest. If they was a preacher ’ere 
I’d go ’n’ see ’im to-morrer ’n’ask 5 im how to git religion.” 

“W’y, it’s all right to git religion if a feller can,” said 
Billy. “ But it alius seemed to me like they was only a 
few as can git it. I don’t fancy a feller can git it jes’ by 
askin’ the preacher fer it. It’s in the nater o’ some, — sort 
o’ in the blood, 'n’ they can’t no more help havin’ it ’n’ 
others can help not havin’ it. It was a part o’ my mother, 
seems to me.” 

“’N’ them ’t can’t git it, what ’s goin’ to ’come o’ them ? ” 
asked Maria. 

“Oh, they’ll burn in hell,” replied Billy, calmly, “if 
the Lord don’t have mercy on ’em at the Las’ Day.” 

“ What a pleasin' prospeck fer you ’n’ me ! ” she said. 
“ Ye ain’t got religion secret-like, have ye ? ” 

“Oh, no, I never could seem to come up to it. They’s 
lots o' things I can't b’lieve, I keep a-doubtin' ’n’ a-doubtin’. 
If I could swoller the hull thing to wunst, I might be all 
right, but I can’t. I keep a-thinkin’ dif’rent pints over, ’n’ 
the more I think, the more I doubt, I never could make 
it go.” 

She looked at him with ready understanding. 

“That’s the way it ’ud be with me, nat’rally, I’m afeerd,” 
she said. “But mebbe, 's ye say, if a feller 'ud make up 
his mind to go the hull thing at the start ’n’ never think no 
more ’bout it, he might git over the trouble o’ doubtin’. 

I can see they ain’t no use tryin' to be religious with a 
mind full o’ doubts. Doubt’s the soul’s consumptive cough 
— they ain’t no mistakin' what’s a-goin’ to foller. Pd try 


1 88 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


to take the hull thing at one lick ’n’ then never think o’ it 
agin. I reckon that ’ud be the best way. ” 

“ Yes, if a feller could do it.” 

“Mebbe 111 try it after a while, if I don’t think of 
nothin’ better,” said Maria. There was a brook tinkling 
over its pebbly bed a little way off and falling into the 
noisy river ; she broke off a piece of bark from the log on 
which she was sitting and tossed it absently into the clear 
small current. 

“They ain’t no preacher anywhere ’roun’ ’ere ’t I could 
go to ? ” she said after a pause. 

“No.” 

“Well, I d’ know ’s I care, nohow. I ain’t nat’rally 
fond o’ the breed. Mebbe it’s jes’ ’s well.” She flung 
another bit of bark into the brook and then said : 

“Seems sort o’ queer to think o’ my tryin’ to be good 
at this late day, don’t it? Mebbe if I’d a-commenced 
sooner it wouldn’t a-come so tough. But I reckon I can 
stan’ the pressure. Most folks ’t I’ve knowed,” she added 
in faint self-justification, “h’ain’t seemed to pay much 
’tention to bein’ good. Most I’ve heerd of in the way o’ 
good things is money ’n’ grub.” 

“Yes, money! Everybody wants money. I’ve seen 
that till I’m half sick o’ the hull money-makin’ bizness, 
sometimes. Money ’s a good thing, but they’s better 
things in the world. It ain’t everything. ” 

“It brings us into the world, keeps us while we’re in it, 
’n’ fin’ly takes us out o’ it,” said Maria, gloomily. “I 
reckon it’s a purty ne’sary thing. If I was a man, I ’d have 
it — heaps o’ it. The thought o’ gettin’ it ’ud make me feel 
like I was a hunter, well-armed ’n’ with a bear in full 
view. I’d have it or die ! ” 

“They’s rich wimmin in the world ’s well ’s rich men,” 
remarked Billy. 

“Yes, but they didn’t earn it, ’n’ they don’t count. All 


IN THE VALLE V OF IJA VILAH 1 89 

a woman wants ’s ’nough to eat ’n’ keep ’er covered. I 
never ’d care to be rich, myself. But if I was a man — ” 

“ I’m glad ye ain’t a man,” laughed Billy. 

“Why?” 

“ ’Cause then we wouldn’t be a-settin’ ’ere ’n’ talkin’ in 
this cof table way.” 

She broke off a larger piece of bark and threw it into the 
river and watched if whirl away. 

“I’m glad ye like to set ’ere ’n’ talk to me,” she said. 
“ Fer I like it, too. ’N’ I like to keep it in mind ’t ye’ve 
been very good to me ’n’ my folks, Billy. ’N’ mebbe 
some day the Lord ’ll let me pay ye back with interest.” 

For the moment she forgot that Billy was her lover and 
remembered only that he was her friend. His recent 
attentions becarnd but an ill-defined memory in contrast 
with the many acts of brotherly kindness he had performed 
for her. Her voice, serious and grateful, made him look 
into her eyes eagerly. She saw in an instant that he had 
mistaken her meaning, that he interpreted her gratitude as 
a more intimate feeling. She did not want him to tell her 
that he loved her — just yet; he might act it, but not speak 
it ; sometime, perhaps, she would allow it, but. not now, 
— she was not in the mood to-day. She wanted to con- 
sider him her good brother to whom she could go in 
trouble, sure of his sympathy and help ; but she did not 
want a lover. Poor Billy ! why could he not understand? 
She had but one weapon with which to beat him back — 
a woman’s surest, most terrible weapon — mockery , she 
felt as if she were a cruel woman to use it, — he would 
look so pitiful with the hope passing out of his face. But 
what else could she do ? There was no use trying to 
think of him just yet as a lover. 

“ Thankee fer them words,” he said, unconscious of the 
change which had taken place in her thoughts. “I’ve 
been thinkin’, Maria — ” 


90 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


She dropped her hands on her knees and stared at him 
with eyes full of mock incredulity. She did not speak 
for a moment after interrupting him by her movement, 
but the time was long enough for him to experience the 
alienation which accompanies an ill-timed silence. 

“ Ye’ve been thinkin’ ? No! Did it make ye tired?” 
She asked with solicitude. The changed voice fell upon 
his ear like a discord ; he felt her altered mood like a 
chill in the air. When he tried to speak again, something, 
he could not tell what, had passed from him and he 
could not bring it back. She had placed him at a dis- 
tance, hei mind was out of touch with his. 

“Oh, be serious,” he said, appealingly, answering her 
look with a forced, tremulous smile, and feeling weak in 
the contest of words which she had begun. “As I said, 
I’ve been thinkin' — ” 

‘ ‘ ' N’ he still lives ! ” cried she, flourishing her hand to- 
wards the mountains as if to call their attention to a sur- 
prising fact. Billy straightened himself on the log and 
looked offended. He had done nothing to deserve her 
ridicule, and why did she persist in it ? 

“Don’t tell me what ’tis ye’ve been thinkin' ’bout. I 
won’t hear it,” she cried, shaking her head positively as 
she saw him about to open his lips. The affair was 
really becoming tragic to Maria ; it cut her to the soul to 
treat him so, but she knew no other way. Her voice 
caught a note of fierceness even in its mirthless mockery. 
“I tell ye I won’t— I won’t ! I know I wouldn’t b’lieve 
it, so what’s the use ! ’N’ sides Billy, I’ve been think- 

in’ lately too.” 

“ Well ? ” he asked, patiently. 

She laughed spasmodically. 

“ It's ’bout the Bible— it’s been a-runnin’ in my head 
lately, ’n’ ye ’member I told ye I used to read it some. 
N here n there a idee sticks to me, when I managed to 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


191 

spell out the words, ye’ll have to listen dost to under- 
stan’ me. They’s a heap o’ fine reasonin’ in it — I’ve been 
thinkin’ ’t the Lord couldn’t a-ben good company.’’ 

Billy opened his eyes wide. 

‘•'Listen,” she cried. “The Bible proves it. For else 
why was Adam lonely in the garden o’ Eden with God 
for a friend ’n’ companion ? ” 

Billy opened his mouth in sympathy with his eyes. 

“Well I can’t see what ye’re drivin’ at — mebbe ye can 
yerself, ” he said. The fact was that Maria herself did not 
see very plainly whither her words tended, but she must 
say something to prevent him from declaring himself. 

“Listen ag’in. It’s nat’ral fer people to want to git 
married, ain’t it ? We’ve inherited it from Adam down.” 

“Yes, it’s a nat’ral thing.” He was quite certain on 
that point. 

“Well, then,” cried Maria, stabbing at nothing with 
her finger as if impaling her opinion on the air, “ I’m a 
onnat’ral critter, — I’m out o’ Adam’s seed entirely, — I 
ain’t human, like other folks be, fer I’m sot agin marry in’. 
Now, I don’t want to hear what ye’ve been thinkin’ ’bout. 
I’m busy.” And she picked up her bonnet and com- 
menced plaiting the strings. 

Her meaning was plain enough, though he did not un- 
derstand it in detail. She did not care for him as an 
lover, only as a friend. What need of understanding 
more ? The conviction filled him with a dull pain, like 
the aching of diseased nerves. And she sat there 
through it all, composed and smiling, evidently caring 
for nothing. All at once by one of those movements of 
contrast in the mind which make us think of comical things 
at tragic moments, a couplet came into his head which 
he had heard the miners sing to a rickety, tuneless air : 

“ ’Tis sweet to love, but oh, ’tis bitter 
To love a gal and then not git her,” 


92 


IN THE VALLE Y OF HA VILAH 


and he broke into a harsh laugh. Maria looked up, sur- 
prised. 

“I wa’n’t laughin’ at ye,” he said apologetically, as if 
she had accused him. “It was at my own thoughts.” 
Then he went on more slowly : “I won’t tell ye what I 
started to, if ye don’t want to hear ; prob’ly it’s the las' 
time I’ll ever mention it to ye ; prob’ly ” 

“Well, we can be friends jes’ the same, can’t we?” 
she asked. 

“Yes, we can be friends, I reckon. That’s the next 
bes’ thing, ain’t it? ” And he laughed drearily. Then he 
was silent a moment or two and she did not dare to 
speak. But all at once he sprang to his feet, and turned 
on her with an impulse of suspicion, and there was a 
rough, undeliberated demand in his voice as he cried, 
“D’ye love anybody else, Maria? Tell me the truth — I 
can stan’ it better ’n bein’ left uncertain. Do ye love any 
other man ? ” 

She smiled, even while she looked up at him anxiously. 

“No — no one else,” she answered, and she thought she 
spoke the truth. 

“Not even — that Hulse ? ’’ 

She rose also and faced him boldly, unflinchingly, for 
as far as she knew she had nothing to conceal. Her face 
was on a level with his and he could note its every feature. 

“That’s a silly question,” she said in a tone of grave 
offense. “O’ course I don’t love^that Hulse. How 
could I when — when I hate ’ im ? I ’member ye hinted 
at that wunst afore, down to the house, there. I tell ye I 
don’t love nobody, ’n’ moreover I don’t want to if it’s 
a-goin’ to make me pester other folks the way it makes 
ye pester me.” 

He was instantly sorry for his words, and tried to take 
her hand. But she drew it away. 


IN THE VALLEY OF It AVI L AIL 


193 

~ I’m sorry,” he said, gently. But she turned her back 
and seemed not to listen. 

“ I didn’t think what I was doin’,’’ he went on, plead- 
ingly. “Ye ain’t mad at me, then, be ye ? See, Mariar ; 
I’m sorry. Ye won’t hate me ’cause I fergot myself fer a 
minute, will ye ? ” 

“ I ain’t mad at ye,” she answered, coldly. “But it’s 
time to go home. Come.” 

“’N’ we’re friends ?” he asked anxiously. 

“ Yes, we’re friends. I told ye so, didn’t I ? ’N’ didn’t 

I tell ye I cared more fer ye ’n fer any man in the world. 
Ye orter a-b’lieved me. Come.” 

Her tone was reassuring, but not warm. 

“’N’ sometime, Mariar — don’t git mad at me fer sayin’ 
it, but seems like I can’t help myself to-day — sometime 
ye’ll lemme speak o’ it agin, after ye’ve had a chance to 
think it over ’n’ decide ? Ye won’t ferbid me that ? ” 

“No, I won’t ferbid ye. But not now. Ye mus’ wait 
a long time. I’ll have trouble, I’m afeerd, in makin’ up 
my mind. ’N’ now let’s go. The sun’s low on the 
mountains.” 

They went back to the cabin together and he left her at 
the gate. He had not made an explicit declaration of 
passion, neither had he been unconditionally rejected. 
Yet she seemed drifting hopelessly away from him, caring 
for the pain she left behind her only in the selfish sense 
that she was glad to be free from it. She felt no pain in 
their alienation. For a brief moment he felt like turning 
back, grasping her and dragging her to him and forcing 
her somehow to share his misery — like hurting her so that 
she would remember as vividly as he must, remember. 
But he did nothing. He was so strong in his love that he 
could bear a great strain in silence. But his silence was 
full of bitterness. 

He passed up the gentle incline between the river and 

13 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


194 

the foothills, but at the mouth of the little canon he paused. 
It looked so dark and lonesome in there, he did not want 
to go in ; he knew beforehand just how dark and heavy 
the shadows would seem, how the rocks would shut out 
the sunshine on all sides and leave nothing bright any- 
where but the narrow strip of sky floating like a blue 
ribbon far above. He sat down drearily at the entrance 
of the canon and looked out across the valley. He would 
never speak to her again on the subject of his love ; how 
could he with the consciousness of this rebuff between 
them ? Billy was quite ignorant of the proverbial elas- 
ticity of lovers’ hopes, and had no idea that in a week’s 
time he would be as hopeful and happy as ever. 

The sun was setting redly and the river caught the light 
wherever the water was visible between the trees. He 
watched the current dashing from light to gloom, from 
gloom to light, and reappearing far down the valley as red 
as if the sunset were rolling in a long-drawn cloud toward 
the folded ridges of the hills below. Then the west dark- 
ened and shook with heavy wind-swung fabrics of sky. 
It was growing cold, too. He would not look any more ; 
he must go home* He turned and entered the little canon. 
Behind him the torn fringes of the worn-out day dragged 
heavily on the mountains ; the sunset lights changed ; 
finally the dark edges of the clouds grew darker, a vivid 
yellow leaped up where the red had been and the heavens 
were a broad glare of Austrian black and gold. But Billy 
was now in the canon and could not see. He would not 
have thought it remarkable had he seen that gorgeous 
sight to-night. What did it matter how the sunset be- 
haved ? Or how dark the canon was, or how desolate 
the cabin by the singing waterfall ? Nothing mattered in 
this miserable world. But he was tired and wanted to 
rest He would go in and lie down and maybe he would 
die before morning, would she care? he wondered. A 


IN THE VALLE Y OF HA VILAH. 


*95 


little, maybe — a very little. The world was so different 
from the world of this afternoon when he had set out to 
see her. Well, well ! It did not matter. He had lived 
up to his motto ; he had failed, trying. 


i 


9 6 


IN THE VALLE V OF HA VILAH. 


CHAPTER XXV. 

“Well, I'm tired to death o’ stayin’ in doors ’n’ I’d like 
to git out som’ers ’n’ see suthin. I ain’t hardly been out- 
side o’ the gate fer two days. I feel like I hain't seen a 
livin' bein’ but you ’n’ pa ’n’ ma sence Is borned. Let’s 
go fer a walk, Mariar.” 

Maud Eliza had come out upon the veranda where 
Maria stood admiring the roses. The sun was setting, and 
in the sky beyond the far mountains, pale green clouds 
floated like shadows down under the sea. 

Maria turned absently. 

“Well, I don’t mind. They ain’t nothin’ to do here. 
Ye go ’n’ fetch our sun-bunnits while I make sure ma’s 
all right afore leavin’ ’er.” And Maud Eliza skipped glee- 
fully away. 

“Ye hadn’t better go down through town,” said 
Ephraim, meeting Maria at the door. “ Ole Sammy’s got 
’er eye on ye. She ’s swore to thump ye black ’n’ blue 
the fust time she ketches ye on the street.” 

“I’ve been on .the street sev’ral times ’n' she ain’t 
thumped me yit,” returned Maria. 

“That’s 'cause she didn’t happen to see ye. I heerd 
this mornin’ ’t she was layin’ fer ye ’n’ ’t she was tearin’ 
mad ’cause she hain’t happend to ketch ye afore now.” 

“I ain’t afeerd o’ ole Sammy,” said Maria, indifferently. 

“She meant it when she said it,” persisted Ephrahn. 
“’N’ ye'd better look out. She ain’t got over what ye 
said to ’er the day we come to Havilah,’n’ she ’s swore 
she’ll have it out with ye. Ye better take keer.” 

Maria sniffed contemptuously. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


19 7 


“ I don’t see what makes ye so keerful o’ me all to 
wunst,” she said. “ It seems to a-took ye all o’ a suddent, 
like a spasm.” 

Ephraim looked really troubled. 

“If ye was to git into a fight with ’er on the street, d’ye 
see, it might make a dif’rence with Billy's feelin’s towaids 
ye. That 's what I’m afeerd of. Billy’s feelin’s is very 
dellycut.” 

Maria laughed. Her father’s selfish solicitude for her 
was explained. 

“I ain’t afeerd,” she repeated. “I can fight if I have 
to. ’N’ I’m sprier 'n ole Sammy is, any day. Is they 
anything ye want afore I go, ma ? ” 

“Oh, don’t mind me,” quavered Mrs. Pugsley, turning 
her head from side to side in moist languor. “ I ain’t no 
’count. Don’t think o’ me. I ain’t in this ’ere world to be 
thought of. Nobody ain’t proud o’ me. Go ’long ’11’ don’t 
mind me ! ” 

Maria arranged the blankets cafefully, smoothed back 
her mother’s hair with a light hand and pinned a news- 
paper across the window so that the late sunshine might 
not enter and fall upon her face. Then Maud Eliza came 
in with their bonnets, and the two girls set out. 

The sunset clouds had deepened and were as rosy as 
pomegranate blossoms. The wind blew freely down from 
the foot-hills ; it was like a voice and a touch from the 
clouds. 

“ I like this,” said Maria, with keen enjoyment of the 
pure air. 

“So d’ I,” said Maud Eliza, “It’s a heap better n stayin' 
there in the house ferever. ’Sides,” she added with a 
titter, “ they’s lots o’ men ’bout the saloons at this time 
o’ day. Let’s go right through camp ! ” 

“I’d ruther take the path by the river,” answered 
Maria, “we can hear the water there.” 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


198 

“ But I don’t want to hear the water,” persisted Maud 
Eliza. “I didn’t come out to hear water.- I want to go 
through camp. Don’t be mean, now. Come on ! ” 

“ I sha’n’t go that way,” declared Maria, stopping. 

“ 0, come on!” urged Maud Eliza, pulling at her 
dress. 

“I sha’n’t! I don’t want a passel o’ men gawpin’ at 
me ’n’ makin' remarks. I’ll go back if ye won’t go by 
the river.” 

“ It ’ud be a heap better fer all o’ us if ye ’d let the men 
look at ye a little more,” said Maud Eliza, not without 
bitterness. 

“Shall we goby the river?” asked Maria, impatiently. • 

“No, I sha’n’t go that way. I come out to see ’n’ be 
seen, ’n’ I’m agoin’ to do it or know the reason why.” 

“I’ll go back if ye won’t go by the river,” repeated 
Maria. 

“ Go back ! ” screeched Maud Eliza. “ Jes’ hear ’er. Go 
back ? Oh, yes, that’s a nice excuse to say ye don’t like 
bein’ stared at by the men. That’s a sweet excuse, that 
is ! I heard what dad was tellin’ ye ’bout ole Sammy. 
Ye’re afeerd o’ ’er — that’s what’s the matter o’ ye — ye're 
afeerd o’ ole Sammy ! ” 

“I ain’t!” cried Maria, flushing at the imputation of 
cowardice. 

“Ye be, too, or else ye’d go straight a-past ’er ole 
saloon with yer nose in the air. It’s jes’ what ye orter do 
to show’er how much ye think o’ her threatenin’ ye. It's 
cowards ’t goes sneakin’ down back ways ’n’ hates to be 
seen, ye’re afeerd o’ ole Samanthy ! ” 

“I don’t go sneakin’ down no back ways, ’n’ I ain’t 
afeerd o’ fifty ole Samanthys ! ” flashed back Maria, red- 
der than ever. 

“Prove it ! ” retorted Maud Eliza, following up her ad- 


IN THE VALLEY OE HA VILAH. 


I99 

vantage. “ Prove it by sailin’ straight through camp ’n’ 
past ’er place with colors flyin’ ! ” 

“I will prove it!” cried Maria, with dilated nostrils. 
“She hadn’t no bizness to threaten me in the fust place. 
I ain’t afeerd o’ old Sammy nor ole Harry nor nobody. 
Come on ! ” 

And they started on again, Maria in advance. 

Our actions are the obedient children of our thoughts. 
From any deed which might bear the construction of 
cowardice Maria shrunk back, strongly remonstrant ; for 
the unpurposed result of all her training had been to make 
her able to take care of herself — even to find occasion for 
demonstrating that ability. At Maud Eliza’s taunts she 
had started up with the fire of a soldier who has a stand- 
ard to defend ; the impulse of the moment was the sum- 
mary of all the habits of her life. But she had gone only 
a few steps toward the main part of the camp before she 
commenced to regret her hasty yielding. Her ideas 
of true womanliness had been changing of late. She 
wished she had not noticed Maud Eliza’s taunts. But it 
was too late now to retreat. She could not face her 
sister’s certain ridicule. Besides, old Samantha might 
not catch sight of her, after all. 

They walked on, Maud Eliza, as in duty bound, exer- 
cising her tittering powers with vigor. She kept close 
enough to nudge her sister in the ribs whenever she 
made an unusually silly remark about “ketchin’ a beau.” 
Maria was accustomed to this kitten-like friskiness of her 
sister, but to-day it annoyed her. 

“ I wish ’t ye’d keep still ’n’ behave yerself ! ” she cried, 
impatiently. “I hate a gal ’t goes snickerin' 9 n* snortin’ 
all over the valley ! ” 

But Maud Eliza, having her own views of the quickest 
and surest way of attracting a beau, paid no attention to 
this remonstrance. As they approached Sammy's place 


2CO 


IN THE TALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


Maria acknowledged to herself that her heart was beating 
a little faster. She was sorry she had come. She had no 
wish to make a spectacle of herself. Perhaps she dreaded 
the thought of an encounter more than the encounter 
itself, for, being in, she was likely to make the opposed 
aware of her. If there should be a row, Billy would be 
sure to hear of it — and that Jim Hulse. Billy might jus- 
tify her in defending herself if she were attacked, but Hulse, 
— she could imagine the look on his face when he heard 
of it, — neither laughing nor sneering, but contemptuous. 
He would look as if she had done something to confirm 
his idea of women. And that would be unbearable. She 
did not wish to confirm his idea of women — she wanted 
to be something unique and impressive in his experience. 
How she wished she had not come ! However, there 

was yet hope. Old Sammy might see them, and then 

They were almost in front of the saloon now. Maria 
drew her sun-bonnet over her face and fixed her eyes on 
the sky in front of her. Maud Eliza was tittering and the 
men were staring. Maria felt their eyes upon her with a 
sense of shame. “Come on,” she whispered hurriedly. 
Something had risen within her which made her resentful 
of the bold looks of these rough men. Time was when 
she would have returned their rude stares with interest 
and taken a coarse pride in “ getting even ” with a sharp 
retort. This old spirit had thrilled her at the moment of 
Maud Eliza’s taunts, but it was all gone now. She held 
her breath as she passed the saloon door, her heart 
stopped beating for a moment. They were past now j yes, 
they were safe for this time — no ! There was a rush of 
heavy feet from the doorway, and Maria felt her arm 
seized from behind. With a wild palpitating fear, such as 
she had never known in all her life before, she opened 
her lips to scream, but she was breathless and could utter 


IH THE VALLEY OE HA VILA1I. 


201 


no sound. It was like a hideous nightmare from which 
she could not awaken. 

The clutch on her arm tightened and she felt herself 
whirled around so as to face the group of men who were 
grinning at her from the platform in front of the saloon. 
Then the grasp on her arm relaxed, and she found herself 
face to face with old Samantha. 

After that first breathless gasp, Maria felt cool and equal 
to the occasion. The old conscious strength returned, 
and her first thought was to be glad that she had not 
screamed. She fixed her undismayed eyes on Samantha’s 
face with the boldness of perfect self-confidence. 

The giantess was looking inhuman, almost tigerish. 
There are still unclassified animals in remote corners of 
the globe ; and women who are exceptions to the general 
rule are met with in society every day. Samantha was 
an unclassified woman. She could hardly be called either 
beast or human, but as a hybrid she had somehow come 
into possession of all the evil qualities of men and brutes. 

Maria stared at her without flinching, then glanced 
down the street with an indifferent air, at the crowd of 
grinning men, now rapidly increasing, and at the saloon 
window in which a scorbutic plum-cake figured dismally 
in proximity to a plate of crummy pastry, bearing the 
placard in big letters, “ Anacondy Downuts.” She noticed 
Samantha's gurgling baby sprawling contentedly over a 
beer barrel, and that it wore a dingy white dress with little 
red spots in it that looked like measles. Then her eyes 
wandered back to Samantha. The woman was clothed 
in a faded buff gown which, Maria thought with a dreary 
sense of her own originality, fitted across her broad hips 
like an immense blister. 

The giantess regarded her victim in gloating silence. 

“Well," said Maria, with a slight lifting of her head. 
“What d’ye want o’ me ? ’’ 


202 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


Samantha patted her on the shoulder, leering and nod- 
ding. 

“ I’ve got suthin’ good fer ye,” she said with a knowing 
wink at the increasing crowd. 

“Any plums in it?” asked Maria with cool impudence. 

Samantha glowered at her. 

“Plums in it ! ” she cried, raising her voice and shaking 
her dishevelled head threateningly, “Don’t gimme none 
o’ yer sass, ye hussy! Plums in it? ye’ll git suthin’ ’sides 
plums, ye cat ! Oh, ye're a purty on e,jyou air. He, he ! ” 

By this time the crowd had increased and formed a 
circle around the two women. The scent of battle must 
have been in the air, for, men, women, children and dogs 
came trooping out of the scattered shanties as if conjured 
up by the wand of an enchanter. The number of human 
beings crowded into those few hovels was incredible. 
Havilah was in high glee. At least two weeks had elapsed 
since the last street-fight between women, and the citizens 
were beginning to feel the need of excitement. The small 
boys were particularly jubilant. 

“A scrappin’-match, by hen ! ” howled one, writhing 
with unholy joy, “Come on, Jimmy, quick! Crawl in 
atween this ’ere feller’s legs if ye want ter see it. My 
buttons, what a circus ? ” 

‘ ‘ Ladies and gentlemen, ” preambled old Sammy, placing 
her immense left hand on her hip and waving her right 
toward Maria, while she surveyed her audience with the 
benevolent consciousness of playing an interesting part 
for their amusement, “ that air wooman orter be dead ’n’ 
buried ’thout a coffin ! ” 

This statement did not seem to affect the audience 
greatly. The citizens of Havilah were too much accus- 
tomed to burying people without coffins to perceive any- 
thing startling in the allusion. Samantha realized the 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


203 

disappointment of her beginning and tacked off again on 
Maria’s looks. 

“Ye’re a purty on e,jyou air,” she cried with fine scorn, 
turning again to her victim. “ Ye’re a fine specimen, 
you air ! I’d like a hull case full o’ ’em like you. Oh, 
yes, I would ! ” 

The audience tittered appreciatively, but Maria, though 
her temper was rising, kept silent. 

“I reckon ye’re mighty proud o’ that complexion o’ 
your’n,” continued Samantha, “ye’ll need a quarter o’ 
beef to poultice it with, though, afore ye say good-bye 
to me. Complexion ! Hoo ! Lord ! If I had sech a 
complexion ” 

“But ye hain’t,” said Maria, keeping her voice steady 
by a great effort. Your’n ain’t no yallerer ’n the av’rage 
Missoury female’s. ’’ 

At this everybody laughed and several men clapped 
their hands as if at a play. Your Californian enjoys an 
imputation on the climate of Missouri. 

For a moment Samantha seemed minded to rush upon 
her victim and end the battle without further verbal pre- 
liminaries, but her tongue as well as her fists had a reputa- 
tion in Havilah, and she was resolved to sustain both. 
The fight could keep for a few moments. She had no 
intention of endangering her reputation as the hardest- 
mouthed woman in camp, of which she was notoriously 
proud. She determined to come out victorious in a war 
of words as well as blows. 

Maria had taken off her sun-bonnet, and was holding it 
in her hands in front of her. 

“Lord, look at the mug o’ ’er ! ” shrieked Samantha, 
throwing up both hands with boisterous laughter. “Jes’ 
look at it ! She’s tuck off ’er bunnit so ’t we can see it 
better. Oh, ye dear, sweet thing ! Lend me yer ear for 
a palm-leaf fan ! " 


204 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


The frown deepened between Maria’s brows. 

“ If I had your face I wouldn’t be afeerd o’ the biggest 
bull-dog ’t ever walked bow-legged,” she said, sullenly. 
A roar of merriment rose from the crowd. 

“Git there, gals ! ” shouted one. _ 

“Give it to ’er ! ” yelled another. 

Then arose a Babel of such cries as : 

“ Fire a rock at ’er ! ” 

“She’s a hull house ’n' lot, she is ! ” 

“ Hooray fer Pugsley’s Mariar ! ” 

“ Hooray fer ole Sammy ! ” 

“Sammy ’s the lad ’t can spin things ! ” 

“ Bust the nose o’ ’er ! ” 

“Slap the jaws off ’m ’er ! ” 

“Oh, chop on yellin’ ’n’ let ’s hear ! ” 

“ Hell ain’t fur off ’m Sammy ! ” 

“ Hooray ! Hooray ! ” 

These indiscriminate cries which coupled her name with 
.that of a notorious woman of the camp, enraged Maria. 
But she had resolved not to begin the conflict. Presently 
old Sammy waved her great arm for silence and the cries 
gradually subsided. 

“I’ll larn ye to laff at me” she resumed, “I’ll larn ye 
what manners is, I’ll read the riot act to ye ! I tell ye, 
ladies ’n’ gentlemen, she cried, raising her fist and speak- 
ing with an air of solemn conviction, “a wooman ’t’s 
up to the tricks o’ this ’ere ’un, — her name is mud! That’s 
what ’t is, mud ! she’d steal acorns from a blind hog. 
She’d — Lor’, they ain’t nothin’ a critter like that wouldn’t 
do. Humph ! ye’re a purty ’un, ain’t ye? ” she continued, 
recurring to Maria’s looks, which seemed to trouble her 
more than anything else. 

“ If I looked like you” cried Maria, “ I’d want a salary 
to stay with myself, / would.” 

Renewed cries of “Go it !‘” and “ Hooray ! ” Maria saw 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


205 

Samantha’s husband among the rest, his little puckered 
persimmon mouth twisted in wild laughter. Maud Eliza 
was tittering near a young man. The sight made her sick 
but she had no thought of retreat. 

Thus far the contest of words had been decidedly in 
Maria’s favor. She had spoken less than her adversary 
but more to the point. This was the kind of oratory 
which Havilah appreciated. Samantha realized her failure, 
but still entertained no thought of yielding to another her 
long-acknowledged supremacy of tongue. 

“Ain’t she a hard lookin’ outfit ?” cried the giantess, 
reverting to her favorite theme. “She's got it into that 
sweet purty head o’ her’n ’t she can come aroun’ ’ere 
puttin’ on doy’s much ’s she likes with ’er airs ’n’ things. 
But she ’ll find she’s got to side-track that. I’ll show ’er 
who’s who ! When I git through with ’er they won’t he’s 
much left o’ er ’s soup on ice ! Nobody ever seen me mak- 
in’ fun o’ a lady as is mindin’ ’er own bizness. If I done 
sech a thing I’d ’spect to be thumped for it soundly. But 
I never ’d lower myself.” 

“It’s ruther disheartenin’ to notice thedif’rence atween 
some folks ’n’ their- idees o’ themselves,” remarked Maria. 

“’N’ so ye’re goin’ to git thumped, ” declared Samantha, 
rolling up her sleeves and preparing for battle. “’N’ I’m 
the lad ’t ’s goin’ to do it. We’ve had ’nough o’ yer blab- 
bin’ n’ sass, ’n’ now we’ll try suthin’ else.- Ye’ve insulted 
the wrong un this time, ye flannel-mouthed jade ! I’m 
a goin to smash ye finer ’n’ powder. ” 

Maria saw that the time was come. She turned white, 
but not with fear. The giantess drew back a few steps, 
flourishing her arms and cursing. Then, pushing her hair 
back from her eyes, she squared herself in pugilistic fash- 
ion and made a frantic lunge at her victim. Maria, how- 
ever, had kept hei eyes on her opponent and exactly at 
the right moment s-tepped aside, letting the unwieldy mon- 


206 IN THE VALLE Y OF HA VILAH. 

ster roll past into the crowd which parted before her as 
before an elephant. Panting with rage at the failure of hex 
first attempt and at the screams of merriment from the 
bystanders, the woman plunged toward Maria again. 

“The Lord hates a coward ! ” she screeched beside her- 
self with fury. “Lemme git at the hussey — I’ll tear ’er 
liver, I’ll chew ’er heart ! ” 

Maria had dropped her bonnet, and was standing with 
set teeth and tightly-clenched hands. Her blood was up, 
she could have fought the whole crowd. Anger is the 
pathmaker of murder, and murder was in Maria’s heart 
at that moment. Her fingers tingled with a mad longing 
to clutch and tear something that could bleed. Samantha 
was not more than three feet away, leaning forward and 
screaming, her venomous face contorted, her rat-like teeth 
protruding, her hands stretched out with a horrid, grasping 
movement. Maria felt the answering fury of a fiend in 
herself but still waited. Suddenly she was conscious of 
being pushed roughly aside. She turned to grapple with 
this new assailant, but, as her eyes fell upon his face, 
her hands dropped helplessly at her side and her white 
lips uttered a feeble cry. The man had stepped in between 
her and her antagonist, and with an outstretched hand 
thrust the giantess back. Maria looked at him only once. 
It was Jim Hulse. Then she covered her face with her 
hands, and stood quite still. 

Samantha was still cursing and swearing and daring the 
whole Pugsley family to combat. Something touched 
Maria’s hand. She uncovered her face and looked up be- 
wildered, but did not let her eyes meet Hulse’s. He was 
holding her bonnet toward her. 

“Take it, and go home,” he said, imperatively. 

She took the bonnet, even while she inwardly rebelled. 

“Go home,” he repeated, seeing that she did not move. 

She fumbled with her bonnet sullenly. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


2 07 

" I reckin I know ’nough to go home when I git ready,” 
she muttered, keeping her eyes on her hands. 

She could not see his face but she felt the fire that leaped 
into his eyes. It was as if a flash of lightning had cleft 
the air close to her face. 

“For shame ! ” he cried, taking a step toward her. “ Go 
home at once.” 

She turned away without another word. He had con- 
quered where old Sammy would have failed. 

A yell of disappointment rose from the crowd. 

“ Shame, shame ! ” cried several voices. 

“Oh, let ’em go it, Hulse ! ” 

“ This is a free country, Hulse. Let ’em fight ! ” 

“Come back, Maria, ’n’ have it out, ye can lick ’er, I 
bet ! ” 

Maria neither turned nor noticed. She slunk home as 
if she had been stripped and beaten in public. So this 
was the pass to which her conceptions of the necessity 
and dignity of self-defense had brought her ; this the re- 
sult of her life-long learning in the school of example which 
had instructed her to champion her cause like a man, 
this the end of all her recent good resolutions. Hulse had 
found her fighting on the street and had sent her home like 
a whipped child. How she hated him for it — how she 
hated herself ! 

“ I wish I was dead, I do ! ” she cried with white lips, 
when she found herself alone under the cottonwoods near 
home. “‘Why can’t he mind his own bizness ’n’ lemme 
be ? ” To appear in a street fight was infinitely worse than 
to show herself in a soiled gown with shoes down at heel 
or to berate him from her own doorway. “ How he must 
hate me, ’n’ how I hate the very thought o’ him !* I wish’t 
I’d a-died afore I ever set eyes on his face ; I do, I do ! ” 

By what power, by what right did that man rule her? 
She loved freedom and independence, but by no effort of 


208 


IN THE VALLE V OF HA V/LAH 


self-assertion could she believe herself wholly out of bond- 
age as before she met him. It was an entanglement of 
horoscopes which she could not comprehend, but which 
made her restive under the decrees of inexorable fate. 

Hulse watched her retreating figure with just the 
shadow of a smile. The crowd was still angry at his 
interference, and frequent curses were mingled with his 
name. 

“The devil’s in Jim Hulse bigger’n a grizzly,” shouted 
someone whom he could not see. 

The smile on Hulse’s lips deepened. 

“The devil is whatever we don’t approve of in other 
people,” he said, and walked away. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


209 


CHAPTER XXVI. 

“I’ve learned a thing or two since I come to Havilah,” 
said Maria, three weeks later as she and Billy sat on 
their favorite log by the river. “Eve learned ’t fightin’ 
ain’t in a wooman’s line. That fracas with ole Sammy 
settled the bizness fer we.” 

“ I never blamed ye,” said Billy. 

“Oh, I know,” she replied, hastily. “ ’T wa’nt that I 
was afeered o’ yer blamin’ me. I knowed ye wouldn’t, 
at the time. I d’ know jest what’s come over me. It’s 
made my temper quieter, anyhow.” 

“I’ve noticed ye’ve been ruther soberer since then.” 

“Yes, it sobered me up a heap, that row did. I d’ 
know why. I wouldn’t fight with nobody now, ’less 'twas 
with dad fer ’busin’ ma, ’n’ I don’t reckon I’d half enjoy’ 
that. ’Pears like suthin’ inside o’ me ’d been a-fightin’ 
me lately ’n’ had come out on top, ’n’ I’d made friends 
with it V felt better. I ain’t what I used to be. It’s 
somehow like I’d been a cryin’ ’n’ had needed it fer a 
long time ’thout knowin’ it. ’ Taint like what I felt when 
I used to be laffin’ so much, but it’s better. It’s like I’d 
growed big in my ideas — I d’ know what it is ! ” She 
shrugged her shoulders impatiently at the failure to an- 
alyze her feelings. 

“Lor’, I don’t see nothin’ to feel bad about,” said 
Billy. “Ye ain’t done nothin’ wrong. Ye ain’t got 
nothin’ to feel sorry fer. ” 

“Oh, I ain’t sorry fer the change in me. That’s jes’ 
what I mean. I ain’t sorry, ’n’ yet I am. Anyways, I 
feel better — like I’d got suthin’ I’d been a needin’ fer a 

14 


210 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


long time. ’N’ I’ll never fight agin ’n’ make a show o’ 
myself, never ! I reckon that may be what makes me 
so much more comf’ table. I won’t bp on the lookout fer 
a chance to fight after this. Only I’m sorry I didn’t make 
up my mind to it sooner. ” 

“I alius admired a gal ’t could take care o’ herself like 
a man,” said Billy. “A wooman orter be able to do it, 
out ’ere. Sometimes she has to.” 

“I didn’t have to, that time,” replied Maria, with a 
shake of her head. “I could a-got aroun’ it somehow 
if I’d a-minded to. ’T was all my fault, every bit. ” 

Billy laughed. 

“ Ye're ’s solemn ’s a judge,” he said. “I hope ye 
ain’t a-goin’ to cultivate sorrer jes for a little thing like 
that. Lor’, what’s life fer if ’t ain’t fer a feller to work it 
fer all they is in it ? A sigh gits a sigh fer answer, a laff 
gits a laff. ” 

“I know — I know,” murmured Maria, still shaking her 
head. “But, they maybe other things ’sides laffin’ ’n’ 
sighin’. I’ve ’mos’ made up my mind ’t life’s a hard 
thing to learn ’bout, Billy.’’ 

“ Ole Sammy’s never tacklM ye sence then, has she? ” 
asked Billy after a while. 

“Oh, no. ’N’ I’ve met ’er lots o’ times, face to face. 
She never looks towards me nor says a word.” 

“I reckon ye showed ’er ye wa’n’t afeerd o’ ’er,” 
chuckled Billy. 

“I ain’t sure ’twas wuth while. She might insult me 
all she wanted to now, ’n’ I’d never notice ’er. ’N’ I’d 
run afore I’d fight.” 

“ Why ? ” asked Billy. 

But she did not answer. Her eyes were fastened 
meditatively upon the river, and she seemed to be think- 
ing in unison with the sound of it. 

“The leaves is all out,” she said presently. “Did ye 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


•21 1 


ever notice what beautiful lights hi’ shadders they is, 
lookin' up in the cottonwoods when the sun shines like 
this? — all shades from gold to black. I like Jo watch 
'em, they change so.'' 

Her eyes wandered dreamily from one object to an- 
other. Around and above her the varnished leaves of the 
cottonwoods flashed in the sun, casting shadow-leavps 
upon the grass. On the farther edge of the valley the 
looming mountains rose white as quartz ; and the river 
filled the world with the strong, voluminous sound of 
rushing water. 

Billy sat with a serene, contented smile, as if pleasant 
thoughts filled the air. Familiarity had only deepened 
his love for Maria and confirmed his resolution to deserve 
her. He would win her at last — he was sure of it. She 
seemed to him no longer a miracle, but a sweet human 
wonder which he could comprehend, at least in part. She 
had been very kind to him of late — ever since that night 
when she had told him that he must wait for her answer. 
He was content to wait as long as there was hope for 
him. He would wait forever in the assurance that she 
might be his at last. 

As they sat thus in silence, the sound of a human voice 
broke in on the deep tones of the river. Two men were 
passing along the path near the bank. Presently their 
words became audible. • 

“ I don't reckon they 'mount to much," said a gossip- 
ing male voice which Maria had never heard before. 
“ Ole Pugsley hisself 's a ragged lot, anyhow. I've heerd 
how he 'spects to do suthin’ with that oldes' darter o' 
his'n, — he told it hisself down to Boosey's Place, — ’spects 
to marry 'er to young Bling, — ye know Bling, o’ the 
Shootin' Star claim that promises so big. I d’ know how 
the match '11 come out. She 's a fine-lookin’ gal 'nough. 


212 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


’N’ I know myself he s’ports the hull fam’ly — he’s bought 
all their grub ever sence they struck the country.” 

“ Indeed?” responded a languid voice which made 
Maria start and turn rigid — the voice of Jim Hulse. 

“They’re a lazy lot of cattle altogether,” continued 
the garrulous stranger. “The ole man won’t work, it ’s 
nothin’ but laziness ails the ole wooman, ’n’ the gals is 
chips o’ the ole block, both o’ ’em. Them gals should go 
to work if they was mine. Now, don’t ye reckon they 
orter, yerself, Hulse ? ” 

“Oh, I suppose so, ’’replied the indifferent voice again. 
And the subsequent conversation of the two men was lost 
in the noise of the river. 

Maria sprang to her feet and stooped to get a better 
view of the retreating figures among the cottonwoods. 
Her lips were parted and her breath came quick, as if she 
had been frightened. Billy had risen too, and was stand- 
ing at her side with angry, blazing eyes. 

“Who is that man with — -him/*” she asked in a hard, 
tense voice. 

“With Hulse, d’ ye mean?” Billy’s voice was tremiflous 
with rage. 

Maria nodded. 

“ They call ’im Cowhide Sam. Let go o’ my arm till I 
thrash the life out o’ him ” 

He moved away from her but she followed, holding 
tightly to his arm. 

“ No ! ” she cried in a tone which made him at once 
obedient. “ I don’t want no more fights, Billy. Let ’im 
go. How d’ ye reckon he found out ’bout ” 

“I can’t tell,” he replied, distressed and angry. “I 
swear to God, Mariar, I never told a livin’ bein’ — never 
hinted at it ” 

“ I know ye didn’t,’’ she said. “ Mebbe he inquired to 
the grocery. They’s plenty o’ people ’t feel out o’ place 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H, 


213 

'less they’re nosin' into other folks’ bizness." She smoothed 
back her hair nervously. “ It don’t matter,” she added. 

“That dirty cuss !” cried Billy, flying into another 
rage. “To go a pryin’ aroun’ like that! I never said 
a word to a livin’ soul to make ’em think it. He must a 
gone to the grocery. The sneak ! I’ll fix ’im yit — see if 
I don't ! ” 

“ No, Billy, don’t ye do that. Don’t ye see it ’ud only 
make things wuss ? Everybody ’d be talkin', 'n’ they’s 
been ’nough talk sence that row with ole Sammy. I don’t 
want no more fightin’. Promise me ye won’t tetch ’im 
nor make a fuss. He was only repeatin’ what he’d got a 
holt of som’ers. Promise ye won’t tetch ’im Billy.” 

“ Oh, well, if* that ’s what ye really want — ” 

“ I reely do. All I’m sorry ’bout is ’t he told Hulse. I 
didn’t want him to know ye was a s’portin’ us. I’ve alius 
hated that feller. He has sech a look — I d’ know what 
it’s like. All I know is ’t I can’t bear the sight o’ ’im. 
’N’ we mustn’t mind what dad says ’bout our man-yin’. 
That’s too foolish. ’N’ now I reckon I’ll go home. ’Pears 
like I feel sort o’ tired.” 

At about the same hour of the same day Mr. Ephraim 
Pugsley sat in close conclave with his wife and Maud 
Eliza. 

“ Mariar orter git married,” the head of the family was 
saying. “ This ’ere beatin’ aroun’ the bush don’t go. She 
don’t seem to have no idee o’ what she ’s doin’. She’ll 
lose Billy yit — I know she will. No sensible feller ’ll stan' 
it. ’N’ then what ’ll ’come o’ us, I’d like to know ? She 
orter git married ; it’s ’er dooty. ’N’ she orter do it to 
wunst.” 

Ephraim spat a generous quantity of tobacco-juice over 
the window-sill and nodded at his wife and daughter. 
Statements like these were easily made, but, without 
Maria’s approval, were of hardly more applicability than 
a group of scientific facts unsystematized 


214 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


“Lor’, I've been tryin’ to talk that into ’er for ever so 
long, ” remarked Maud Eliza, with a titter of habit rather 
than of mirth. 

“The Swipeses all got husban’s young,” quavered Mrs. 
Pugsley, using her favorite analogy. “’N’ I don’t see 
why Maria shouldn’t. She’s a Swipes on ’er mother’s 
side.” 

“Swipes or no Swipes, she orter marry,” declared 
Ephraim. “ She’s old ’nough. ” 

“Old ’nough!” screeched Maud Eliza, flinging up 
both hands and snorting. “I should think she was old 
’nough ! She’d orter be ’shamed o’ ’erself — I’m sure I’d 
be if I ’s her. Old ’nough ! W’y she’s gittin’ to be a 
reg’lar ole maid ; she’s more ’n two year older ’n I be ! I 
jes' wish’t I had her chance. I’d show ye a thing or two 
’t ’ud make yer eyes peel ! ” 

“ W’y, you ’d marry to wunst ’n’ no monkeyin’,” said 
Ephraim, expectorating again. 

“Wouldn’t I ?” cried Maud Eliza, with a horse laugh. 

“Sensible gall” said the approving father. 

“ Maud Elizy was alius more o’ a Swipes ’n what 
Mariar was,” put in Mrs. Pugsley. “ Mariar’s a good 
’nough gal — she’s alius waited on me the best she knowed 
how, though sometimes it seems like she might a-done 
suthin’ more for my side when it was achin’ fit to split off : 
but she ain’t got no style ; Maud Elizy’s got all the style 
o’ the fam’ly. She’s all Swipes, Mariar don’t seem to 
take after nobody in partic’lar. ” 

“ I wish ’t she’d take after Billy Bling in partic’lar,” said 
Ephraim. 

“So d’l,” said Maud Eliza, “It’s time she was out o’ 
the way. I’ll have lots better chances to ketch a feller when 
she’s gone. All the men go a gaddin’ after her, ’n’ won’t 
look at nobody else while she’s aroun’. ’N’ she jes’ don’t 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


215 


,3e ’em or seem to know what they’re after. It makes 
ne mad ! Why can’t she freeze onto Billy ’n’ be done with 
it, I’d like to know ? What do the men see in ’er, any- 
how, I wonder? She ain’t lively, — she don’t hardly ever 
laff now-days, — she’s a heap soberer ’n what she used to 
be. I can’t understan’ it, for that ’s what the men likes, 
is laffin’.” 

“ That’s what I’ve alius said,” declared Mrs. Pugsley, 
raising herself on her elbow and looking interested. “ I 
was alius laffin’ fit to kill when I was a gal, ’n’ I had lots 
o’ beaux — hull caboodles o’ ’em. They tagged me all 
over the kentry ’n’ wouldn’t gimme no peace o’ my life. 
I’m proud o’ ye, Maud Elizy. Ye take after the Swipeses. 
Stick to yer laffin’ if ye want to ketch a man.” 

She sank back on her blankets with an air of mingled 
dampness and maternal pride. 

“Mariar’s idees is so queer,” continued Mr. Pugsley. 
“She don’t seem to see things the way they be. She’s 
too hard-headed. She don’t think o’ the dooty she owes 
’er family. She orter think o’ that.” 

“ Course she orter,” assented Maud Eliza. 

“ Billy’s one o’ the fines’ fellers in this ’ere hull camp, 
too, not mentionin’ that Shootin’ Star claim o' his which is 
pannin’ out wonderful. Anybody ’ll tell ye that. He’s 
good-natered ’n’ easy, ’n wouldn’t be hard on his wife’s 
relations. That’s where the beauty o’ Billy Bling lays — 
he wouldn’t be hard on his wife’s relations. He’d take 
care o’ ’em ’s tender ’s if they was little kids, or suthin’ brit- 
tle. He’d give ’em — or leastways the male part o’ ’em — 
a little salary fer — fer expenses. That’s jes’ his style. I 
can’t see why Mariar keeps a-waitin’ ’n’ a-waitin’. It can’t 
be she keers fer no other feller. ” 

Maud Eliza shook her head emphatically. 

“It ain’t no other feller, dad. I know what it is — it’s 


21 6 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH 

jest to spite me. I am completely disgusted with Mr^ 
riar.” 

“ ’1ST Billy’s prospects is ’way-up. He’ll be one o’ tht^ 
richest men in the State some day. When things reely git 
agoin’ right, his claim ’ll turn out millions.” 

“A man like that is worthy o’ a Swipes,” remarked 
Mrs. Pugsley. N’ I hope if she ketches ’im she’ll live 
like a Swipes ’n’ not get to be a low, no ’count critter 
’t nobody takes pride in ’n’ ain’t got nothin’ to the side o 
’er but a pain. Maud Elizy, ye’ll have to git me a new 
stickin’ plaster. I thort I could do ’thout it, but I’m 
afeerd I can’t.” 

“I like success wherever I find it,” continued Eph- 
raim. “It’s alius safe to hitch onto a successful man; 
he’s sure to pull ye som’ers V land ye higher ’n what ye 
was afore. ’N’ Billy’s a successful man, ’n’ I love ’im ’n’ 
admire ’im ’n’ I want ’im fer a son-in-law ; ’n’ if we can 
only fetch Mariar to time, our troubles ’ll all be over.” 

But appreciation of success by no means constitutes 
success. The river Alpheus reflected many an Olympic 
victor in olden times, and gained never a bit of force by 
so doing. 

Mr. Pugsley, though professing to be greatly disap- 
pointed at his prolonged failure to get work, had found 
life at Havilah just what he had always found it in other 
places, — a period of thriftless idleness, antecedent to 
some great good luck which was sure to turn up in a 
few days. He seemed to have regulated his conduct ac- 
cording to the principles of a triune laziness which might 
be formulated as follows : The less I have to do, the less I 
want to do ; the more I have to do, the less I want to 
do ; so the only course left open to me is to do as little as 
I can. This mode of existence had seemed especially 
satisfactory of late, inasmuch as Mr. Pugsley’s amor- 
phous good luck seemed likely to be crystallized very 


17V THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


217 


soon in Maria's marriage, and meanwhile Billy provided 
the family with everything necessary, showing at the 
same time a beautiful willingness to continue his gen- 
erosity indefinitely. 

To Mr. Pugsley's grief and surprise Maria came in on 
this particular afternoon and declared with considerable 
emphasis that she was tired of living on charity and that 
not another mouthful of provision bought with Billy's 
money should ever enter that door again. 

“ I’ve only put up with it so long,” she declared, “ be- 
cause I've been thinkin’ every day ye might git suthin’ 
to do. But I know well 'nough ye don’t half try. If ye 
ask for work at all, ye keep prayin' all the time inside o’ 
ye 't ye won’t get it. Ye jest set aroun' the saloons from 
mornin' till night, waitin’ to git treated, 'n' soakin' up the 
whiskey like ye was a sponge. I shan't put up with it 
no longer. Ye can go to work or starve along o' the rest 
o' us — so there ! ” 

“But I thought it was understood — ” began Ephraim 
with wide open eyes. 

“Ye thort it was understood we was alius agoin' travel- 
lin’ in style 'cause we had a free hoss to ride ? Oh ! ye 
thort that, did ye ? Well ! ye'll find out dif'rent. We've 
had enough o’ this. Billy’s offered ye work, honest 'n' 
honorable, at good wages, if 't is hard, ye can dig 's well 
's' the next 'un, if ye've a mind to — they ain’t a tougher 
ole bone nowheres outside o' a nigger's skull 'n what you 
be, all over. 'N' if ye won’t do it, w'y — ” Maria nodded 
her head with awful meaning, and after a moment added : 

“I wish’t I was a man ! I'd show ye what a man can 
do. I wouldn't sponge ; I'd work ! ” 

Mr. Pugsley felt that the time for prompt action had 
come. He edged toward the door with two definite pur- 
poses in view, — to say what he had to say and to dodge 
the consequences by precipitate flight if necessary. He 


2l8 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


had never wholly forgotten his plan of utilizing his daugh- 
ters’ labor as a means of increasing his income, but 
Billy’s generosity had thus far made any reference to 
the matter unnecessary. But now he must act. Any- 
thing, even Maria’s anger, was preferable to daily labor 
with pick and shovel, and Maria’s last words had paved 
the way for what he wanted to say. If she liked to see 
people work, by hokey ! she should have the chance to 
try it herself. He reached the open doorway and stood 
there a-tilt on one leg, watchful, meditative and calculat- 
ing. 

“Wimmin sometimes works,” he said, cautiously. 

“Well, ’n’ don’t I work ?” cried Maria, hotly. “Who 
gits yer grub ’n’ washes yer dirty duds ’n’ builds the fires, 
I'd like to know ? If ye done half ’s much ’s I do, we 
wouldn’t a-had to live on charity, with folks talkin’ ’bout 
it in the streets ’n’ all over the woods. Dad,” she cried, 
with a sudden vehement earnestness, “ what is they here 
’t a gal can do to earn money ’n’ make ’erself indepen- 
dent ? I’ll work my fingers to the bone ’afore I’ll let this 
’ere thing go on. I won’t be dependent on nobody ! ” 
She leaned toward him, her voice piteous, as if pleading 
for help from danger. 

Ephraim heaved a long, relieved sigh. 

“ That’s what I got up to say to ye,” he said, resuming 
his seat by the window. “ ’N’ now ’t ye’re ready to hear 
it, I’ll tell ye what I think. Ye’re a strong gal, Mariar; 
ye admit that much ? ” 

“Yes.” 

“ So’s Maud Elizy.” 

“Yes.” 

“ Well ! Some wimmin takes in washin’ ’n’ makes 
miners’ wages at it. That’s what I had to say.” 

He crossed his legs and expectorated over the window- 
sill. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


219 

Maria went to the door and looked out toward the river. 
The young dancing leaves turned the sunbeams from 
green to silver, from silver to green, as the wind passed, 
and the sound of the river was like the voice of a friend. 
Far off the pines lay along the mountains like the shadows 
of resting clouds. Her eyes fastened upon them me- 
chanically. What her thoughts were Ephraim could not 
guess. It was enough for him to know that she was not 
angry. 

The day passed as usual. Maria spent the rest of the 
afternoon at home, and when Ephraim returned from 
Boosey's in the semi-gloom of the sweet spring evening, 
he discovered, tacked to the side of the house under the 
old veranda, a strip of white muslin, bearing in ill-shaped, 
straggling letters the words, “Citty Londry,” and Maria 
herself stood in the doorway smiling as he had never seen 
her smile before, but with something in her look that for- 
bade him to speak a word. She had gone through a 
struggle with her pride which none could have compre- 
hended but herself. 

Ephraim sat down at table in silence and she heaped 
his plate full-; then, without a word, she left the house, 
and he saw her disappear among the shivering cotton- 
woods by the river. 


220 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


K 


CHAPTER XXVII. 


BrLLY did not come down to camp after this for three 
whole days, not because he had any especial reason for 
staying away, but it seemed good to look forward to 
meeting Maria after a long absence — it seemed tremen- 
dously long to him — as an accumulated joy worthy of 
much self-denial, as a sort of laying-up of spiritual 
treasures on earth with the certainty of enjoying them in 
heaven. There was something very pleasant in the belief 
that his absence would make her think of him and wonder 
why he stayed away. 

Sometimes at intervals of his work he amused himself 
by wondering if his thoughts, going down to her in the 
valley, should meet hers coming up to him, what they 
would say to each other. He half believed that they 
actually had met thus more than once, that he had often 
conversed with her, though out of sight and hearing. It 
is an old belief with lovers — perhaps an intuition — that 
love bridges space and time, and lets thought pass freely 
across the chasm of the universe. 

But now, whistling gayly, Billy passed under the cot- 
tonwoods which grew around the Pugsley cabin. The 
branches seemed beckoning him to play, he thought, as 
when he was a boy. Close by the path leading from the 
gate to the veranda a little fig-tree, which he had planted 
two years before, lifted its clear emerald candelabra to- 
ward him as he passed, and a weeping willow poured 
into the air a shower of pale green spray, like some 
marvelous fountain of Arabian romance. And the roses, 
ah! the roses that hung from the rude old porch, how 


1 


< 


j 




IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


22 I 


they crowded and pushed and jostled to get into the 
sunshine, and how the bees, rose-cradled, worked and 
hummed and fell into a trance of delicious slumber when 
the wind rocked them just right ! 

“ Mariar likes seen things,” Billy thought, ascending 
the steps lightly. “ How queer ’t I planted the roses fer 
her ’thout knowin’ it ! ” 

Then he looked up and saw the strip of white muslin on 
the side of the house. He stopped short and stared at it 
several moments before he could comprehend its full 
meaning. 

“ It’s that Cowhide Sam’s doin’s,” he muttered. “ It’s 
what she heerd him say to Jim Hulse ’t ’s drove her to it.” 

He cast a sweeping glance around the yard. A big 
washing was strung out on the lines to dry. 

“ She ain’t a-goin’ to do that sort o’ bizness if I can help 
it,” he declared to himself as he knocked at the door. 
“ She’s too good fer it. Lord, to think o’ the money I’ve 
got, ’n’ her takin’ in washin’?” 

Maria herself came to the door, smiling, but looking 
flushed and tired. 

“Come in, come in ! ” she cried, heartily. “Ye better 
interduce yerself, seems to me, ye’re sech a stranger. 
La ! I ain’t seen ye fer a coon’s age ! Where ye been 
keepin’ yerself ? Take a seat ’n’ set down.” 

Her greeting was unusually cordial, and she was un- 
feignedly glad to see him. She held out her hand and he 
took it gently, almost reverently, keeping his eyes fixed 
upon her face. 

“ I’d ruther not come in this afternoon, if ye don’t 
mind,” he said. “ It’s so pleasant I’d ruther be outside. 
Wouldn’t ye like to put on yer bunnit ’n’ go fer a little 
walk? We can take it slow,’’ he added, fearing she 
might say she was too tired, “ ’n’ we needn’t go fur.” 

She went for her bonnet without replying, and he 


222 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


thought she moved wearily. Presently she stood beside 
him again. 

“ Seems like I never seen the roses so thick,” he said, 
pulling a big cluster as they descended the veranda steps. 
“ Ye like sech things don’t ye, Mariar?” 

“Oh, yes ! ” was the quick answer : 

“Take these, then,” said he, handing her the flowers, 
“ V stick ’em under yer chin, through the buttonhole 
there. Ay, that’ looks fine agin the white skin o’ yer 
throat ! We’d better walk by the river where it’s level, 
hadn’t we ? ” 

“ We alius walk by the river ! I’ve been there with ye 
a thousan’ times.” 

“’N’ I hope ’ll go there with me a thousan’ times more 1 
Would ye ruther go som’ers else ? ” 

“Oh, I ain’t partic’lar — anywheres ’ll do.” 

“I thought ye looked too tired to go up towards the 
foothills.” 

“Oh, I ain’t tired, ” she answered. ‘ ‘ Leastways, not so 
very. Come to think, I’d ruther go up to the foothills. 
They’s jes’ time for a good climb afore sunset. I’ve 
been in the house all day. I’d like to git up high — where 
I can look down on folks,” she added, with that mirthless 
little laugh he had noticed when she was not quite her- 
self. 

“I don’t think ye orter,” objected Billy. “Ye look 
dead tired ’n’ all done up. I wish ? t ye’d go by the river. ” 

She did not answer, but preceded him in the path which 
led toward the foothills. 

“Oh, well, all right ! ” he said. “ But mind, ye can’t 
look down on me if I stay along o’ ye 1 ” 

He caught up with her and' walked at her side in the 
heavy grass. He wanted to be where he could look into 
her face and study the meaning of her eyes and lips. It 
is as natural for us to stand close to those who nourish 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


223 


our spiritual needs as for rushes to grow by the water. 

Into the cool dark gulch they passed, with the shadows 
thick around them. Here where the sunbeams pene- 
trated for but an hour or two during the day, the belated 
buds of the willow were spreading their tiny wings as if 
for flight, and the little cottonwood leaves seemed always 
reaching toward each other in a vain endeavor to shake 
hands. Wild roses, as sweet as only California roses in 
March can be, had pushed back their green calyxes and 
were peeping out into the late spring world. 

“Let us rest here,” said Billy as they reached a shelv- 
ing rock beside the path. “I know ye mus’ be tired. 
Come, set down here beside me. W’y, yer face is flushed 
red V yer breath comes short ! What a brute I be, not to 
a-noticed sooner ! 

She did not resist as he drew her down upon the rock 
at his side. 

“ Mariar,” he began at once with great earnestness, “ I 
want ye to tell me suthin’ — suthin’ ’t I orter know.” 

“ ’Bout myself ? ” 

“Yes, ’bout yerself.” 

“Well, what is it? I ain’t promised to answer, ye 
know.” 

He rose and stood before her so that she could not hide 
her face. 

“ I want to know why ye’ve decided all o’ a sudden to 
work like this — to take in washin’.” 

She laughed somewhat harshly. 

“ Oh, is that all ? ” she said. 

She picked up a loose stone and sent it rolling down 
the path. 

“ W’y, I reckon ye orter be able to answer that ques- 
tion fer yerself, Billy. Ye wa§ along- o’ me ’n’ heerd what 
that Cowhide Sam said,” 


224 IN THE VALLE Y 0F HA VILAH ' 

She loosened another stone with her foot and watched 
it bound down the mountain side. 

“ What he said to that Hulse,” she added after a 

moment. 

“But it don’t signify ’t ye’re goin’ to work yerself to 
death jes’ ’cause a stranger spoke like that!” cried, 
Billy. 

“I won’t work myserf to death,” was her response. 
“I couldn’t if I tried. Ye don’t knowhow tough I 
be.” 

“But, Mariar — — ” 

She turned on him fiercely. 

“ D’ye reckon I’m goin’ to live on charity n’ have folks 
lookin’ down on me when I’m able to work ’n’ take care o’ 
myself? ” she cried. Then in a suddenly softened tone, 
“I know ye mean all right, Billy, ’n’ ye don’t look at it 
as charity. But other folks does ’n’ so do I. I never 
reely thought o’ it afore, but now — I can’t — I can’t some- 
how bear to be beholden to ye.” 

“But, Mariar, yer father’s plans ” 

She arose with a movement of her shoulders as if cast- 
ing off a heavy load. 

“My father don’t plan fer me,” she said, coldly. “ I’m 
able to earn ’nough fer ma’s wants, ’n’ that’s the main 
thing. I won’t take charity from nobody.” 

She moved on up the mountain side and he was obliged 
to follow. 

“It’s only a little ways up to the top from here,” she 
said. “ Let’s hurry or the sun ’ll be down.” 

They climbed the steep ascent to the summit from 
which the valley was spread out below them like a map. 
Standing together in silence, they looked down with that- 
sense of incorporeal power which, when gazing from a 
height, merges one’s thoughts and emotions into a con- 
sciousness of regnant force and spiritual overlordship. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VI LA H. 


225 


They seemed alone together above the broken, receding 
world. Almost unconsciously Billy took her hand and 
she yielded it to him without noticing. 

Presently she drew away and seated herself on the top- 
most rock. 

“I am cold,” she said with a shiver. 

He took off his miner’s jacket and wrapped it tenderly 
around her shoulders. 

“We’d better go back,” he said. 

“Not yit,” she answered. “I want to think.” 

Her eyes wandered away to the far mountains which 
were covered with snow as with a cloak of ermine. Billy 
seated himself at her side, devouring the look of her 
wrapt, unconscious face. 

“Mariar,” said he at last, very softly, half fearing to 
break in upon her meditations. 

“Well? ’’she answered without taking her eyes from the 
horizon. 

“ Look at me,” he said. 

She turned her eyes toward him with the mechanical 
obedience of one half-awakened from a dream. 

“ Well ?” she repeated. 

He moved closer to her. 

“I want ye to give up this wild idee o’ your’n,” he 
said, appealingly. “What bizness ’as sech a gal as you 
be to work like a common woman ? ” 

She smiled bitterly. 

“I should think ye would a-found out by this time ’t 
I ain’t no better ’n the common run. They was a time 
when I wouldn’t a-done it’n’ wouldn’t a-cared who bought 
the vittleSj jes’ so I got my share. But it ain’t like that 
now. Lord ! what’s the use o’ longin’ to go idle when 
everything shows ’t we was made to work ? Life without 
work s like a steam-engine with the fires out ’n’ nothin’ 
in the biler,” 


15 


226 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


She spoke with superficial cheerfulness. Billy listened 
to her quietly but without understanding a word. 

“ I want ye to let me keer fer ye, alius,” he said, when 
she had finished. “Ye said I might speak to ye agin 
sometime, V ’pears like I can’t wait no longer. I’ve got 
money ’nough fer both o’ us ’n’ to spare. ’N’ I love ye 
honest ’n’ true. They’s nothin’ I wouldn’t do to make ye 
happy ; no sufferin’ I wouldn’t go through, no trouble nor 
sickness if ’t would bring a good to ye ; ’n’ I only want 
the chance to prove my words. Will ye marry me, 
Mariar ? ” 

She shrunk away from him a little, but did not answer. 
Her eyes met his, almost frightened. 

“ I love ye,’' he repeated, putting his arm around her 
beseechingly, protectingly. “ See how my heart beats 
ag’in’ ye — look at me — ye mus’ know it. I’d die to make 
ye happy — I’d — ” he paused suddenly, as if ashamed of 
his growing earnestness. “ I’d treat ye as the wooman 
I love orter be treated, — as the best ’n’ loveliest wooman 
in the world orter be treated. Ye needn’t work no more, 
dear — never, ’n’ yer folks shall be comf table, too. I’ve 
got ’nough fer all o”us.” 

She let her head rest against him for a moment ; now 
she drew away, but kept her eyes fastened upon his as if 
reading the bared tablets of.his soul. 

“ I ain’t worthy o’ ye, Billy,” she cried with sudden 
vehemence, turning her eyes away. He was about to 
reassure her with words of affectionate protest when she 
pushed him away from her, shivering. Then she looked 
at him once more. •. 

“ I don’t want ye to misunderstan’ me,” she cried, with 
a flash. “ I’m a decent wooman — a honest wooman ; it 
ain’t that. In that way I’m good ’nough fer any man— 
fer any man — d’ye hear ? ” Her voice rose to a shrill cry 
of passionate self-assertion, and then she shook her head 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA II 


227 


as if recollecting herself and went on in a milder tone : 
“ But they’s other things — they’s other things. I don’t 
want to talk of it no more, now. Wait ! ” 

He looked at her piteously. 

“ That’s what ye said afore,” he returned. “ Must it 
alius be wait ? Must I alius ” 

She drew his coat around her with a shiver. 

“ It’s cold here,” she said. “I felt it when I fust come 
up. ’N’ I think I am tired, after all. That was a big 
washin’ of ole Dr. Pilldabber’s — the biggest I ever seen. 
They’ve got no end o’ brats, them Pilldabbers. I had 
fourteen gingham aperns. But he’s good pay — he’s good 
pay. Don’t talk ’bout it no more now, Billy. Wait- 
wait ! ” 

In silence they passed down the mountain side together. 
The sun was setting, and there was something fiercely 
gorgeous in the jumbled colors of the western sky. The 
trees caught flakes of red light on their branches like 
pomegranate blossoms, and down in the valley the river 
flared like a moving conflagration. 

“ We orter a-gone sooner,” muttered Maria, still 
shivering. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


22 S 


CHAPTER XXVIII. 

One Sunday afternoon Jim Hulse sat in his open door- 
way gazing out absently into the valley. It was known 
of him that his opinions were strongly atheistic, and yet 
he had been heard to utter Christ’s name with reverence, 
and' he had never been seen at work on Sunday. A book 
lay on his knee which he had evidently just finished. It 
was Romola. The book was open at the fly-leaf on which 
these words had just been penciled in a firm, uncial hand : 

“ The creative faculty is the nearest approach of man 
to God, of the finite to the Infinite. For the mighty few 
whom we call geniuses is reserved the glorious assurance 
that they have had some share in moulding the beliefs 
and actions of humanity after the pattern of all good. It 
is a tremendous thing to bring beauty out of ugliness, 
order out of chaos, and earnestness out of indifference.” 

This man who, like Layamon of old, “read books,” 
had arranged his library on a long shelf above the table 
where the familiar gilt titles could look down at him as he 
sat at his meals. There were a few works of science, 
several histories, and some of the best novels. But most 
of the volumes were poetry. “ II est plus aisd de con- 
11 oitre l’homme en general que de connoitre un homme 
en particulier,” says La Rochefoucauld ; and we may be- 
lieve that the linking together of impressions which had 
shaped Jim Hulse’s preference for the literature of senti- 
ment, had been as mysterious as the exceptional events 
that had moulded his life into its present arbitrary con- 
figuration. 

Most of Hulse’s books bore an inscription in the same 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


229 

spirit as the one he had just penciled on the fly-leaf of 
Romola. It was his habit to epitomize his impressions, 
to sum up an author, and, so to speak, run a pin through 
him as a means of holding him fast in his collection of 
psychological specimens. The reader may not be unwill- 
ing to examine a few of these summaries. 

I11 a volume of society verses was written : “ This is 
one of the many poets whose voices quaver into momen- 
tary prominence and then are heard no more.” 

“ Rosetti, in his admiration for the beautiful, not only 
twines the frame of his lyre with flowers, but the strings 
also.” 

Swinburne : “A disciple of fever and ague.” 

Tennyson's In Memoriam : “ A pretty shroud, manu- 
factured by one who has original ideas in funereal tucks 
and ruffles.” 

Longfellow : ‘ ‘ The land of song is the broadest of all ; 
its boundaries are the viewless limits of the human heart. 
Poetry is life not as it is, but as it should be. ” 

Chatterton : “Few stars touch the zenith. Nay, all 
stars touch the zenith of some place. ” 

Chaucer: “These Songs of Eld flow refreshingly 
through the present like a clear, cold stream through a 
barren country. Truly, old books have young life in 
them. ” 

Walt Whitman : “A cow, strayed into the garden of 
poesy ! ” 

“ Shakespeare in his art stands like these mountains, 
eternal and alone.” 

“ Shelley's thoughts fly from him wild and free, created 
as God created the birds of the sky.” 

On a novel by George Sand was scribbled : “ Mar- 
riage, like moonlight, is perfect in an ideal sense, but 
faulty for the practical uses of life.” 

One classical work was visible — a worn copy of the 


230 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


Iliad in Greek, in which was written : “ Were we all 
gods like the gods of old, what a gloom we would make 
of life’s glory ! ” And underneath, apparently as a bitter 
afterthought, “ One need be but a common mortal to do 
as much as that.” 

Hulse leaned back in his chair with his hands clasped 
behind his head and his long legs extended. Just outside 
the door stood a wild plum-tree in full blossom ; the sound 
of bees among its branches rose dreamily, palpitatingly, 
like genial warmth from a sunny place. Out in the valley 
he could see straying cattle, and he imagined the fra- 
grance their heavy feet crushed from the sweet wild 
flowers. A few tame doves circled above the cabin and 
settled lightly upon the roof and about the yard-like en- 
closure. The rivulet flowed past with a quiet hymn for 
the rare bright Sabbath. 

“ No wonder the Romans heard spirit voices in the 
sound of running water,” thought Hulse. 

He was aroused from his musings by the appearance 
of two figures, a man and a woman, advancing slowly 
through the rocky opening of the enclosure. He regarded 
them with displeasure and surprise. They were Billy and 
Maria. The girl was walking a little behind her com- 
panion, looking half timidly, half defiantly over his 
shoulder. Hulse’s face darkened. He arose and stood 
in the doorway as if to bar them out. 

“ Well ! ” he said, when they had stopped quite close 
to him. After the first quick glance his features had set- 
tled into the mask-like indifference which was so strongly 
at variance with the phosphorescent gleam of his eyes. 

Billy laughed. 

“Why, Hulse,” he said, “ye must a-had a row with 
them books o’ your’n to treat callers like this. *This ’ere’s 
Mariar. Ye’ve seen ’er afore — wunst at her own house 
V wunst on the street. Ye orter ’member.” 


IN THE VALLE V OF HA VI LA H. 


2 3 r 


“ I don't remember, ” was the curt answer. 

Billy’s eyes opened very wide. 

“ W’y — y,” he began, prolonging his vowel the better 
to express his surprise, “ don’t ye ’member — w’y, ye must 
’member, — how ye parted her ’n ole Sammy — how she 
give ye Had Columby from the porch ” 

“Ye needn’t ’mind him o’ meetin’ me,” interrupted 
Maria. “ I’m sure I ain’t got no wish to ’member, 
nuther.” 

“ Ah, that was Maria, was it ? ” asked Hulse. 

“ Queer ’t ye couldn’t ’member,” said Billy. 

“ Very queer,” was Hulse’s answer. 

“ Would ye mind gittin’ out o’ the door ’n’ lettin’ the 
lady set down?” inquired Billy. “We’ve had a long 
walk ’n’ she’s tired. It was my doin’s ’t she stopped — she 
didn’t want to ’n’ wouldn’t fer a long time. I fetched ’er 
in to rest a minute ’n’ git a drink afore we started back to 
Havilah.” 

“I suppose she can sit down,” said Hulse, ungra- 
ciously. He left the door, picked up the volume which 
he had laid on his chair, and then motioned her to the seat. 
“ I don’t receive callers, especially women. You know 
that, Bling.” 

“ I know ’t ye’ve alius acted like a white man when 
I’ve been here afore,” said Billy, with considerable heat. 

Hulse smiled — the smile which no one liked. 

“ Pray sit down, Miss— Miss Maria,” he said, pushing 
the chair toward her. 

“ I don’t want to set down,” said Maria, sullenly. 

“ Shall we go on ’n’ I come back ’n’ settle with ’im 
afterwards ? ” cried Billy in open anger. 

“ I didn’t want to come,” muttered Maria. “ ’Twa’n’t 
none o’ my doin’s, Mr. Hulse. I want ye to understan 
that.” 

“ I beg you, Miss— Miss Maria, be seated.” The smile 


2 32 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


on Hulse’s face deepened as she took the chair reluctantly, 
keeping her face lowered from his while her hands fumbled 
with her apron. 

She was rapidly debating with herself what it was best 
to do. If she left the cabin in wrath, Billy would be sure 
to avenge the discourtesy which had driven her forth, and 
blows, if not bloodshed, would follow. Good-natured as 
he was he would hesitate at nothing where her honor was 
concerned. She reddened with vexation and wounded 
pride, yet was driven by fear to acquiesce in a hateful 
position. But quarrel there should be none if she could 
avoid it. Better suffer for a little while the pangs of 
wounded egotism than the retributive justice of knowing 
that she had endangered Billy’s life or, — she admitted the 
fact to herself with resentful anger, — the life of this man 
whose assumption of sovereignty was destined for her 
abasement. 

“ So your name is Maria,” Hulse said, after a silence 
which had lasted longer, she thought, than she could bear. 

“Yes,” she replied, faintly. She wondered if he re- 
alized how completely she felt in his power. 

“An ugly name. I’ve always hated the name of 
Maria.” 

She flashed a quick glance at him as if to deny that she 
cared for his disapproval, but as his eyes met hers she 
felt her lids contracting as before a glaring light ; then 
she said with strained acquiescence : 

“ It is a ugly name. I’ve alius hated it myself.” 

There was another trying pause. 

“You need not mind the ugliness of it,” he said finally 
“what’s in a name? You may not be aware of the fact, 
but the Greeks called July the month of Hecatombaeon, 
and yet they were a happy people.*” 

Maria did not like his tone and found herself trying to 
disentangle his meaning from his manner of utterance, 


W THE VALLEY OF H A VI L AIL 


233 

but failed. He intended to sneer at her. She hoped that 
Billy noticed nothing but the bare incomprehensible words. 

“I reckon ye git that way o’ talkin’ out o’ yer books,” 
she said, weakly. “I don’t reckon I’d like yer books,” 
she added, almost haughtily. 

Hulse regarded her with half-shut eyes through which 
the flame gleamed. 

“You are honest, at any rate,” he said, slowly. 

She did rtot look at him but sat quite still, except for a 
slight muscular movement of her arms and shoulders, as 
if she were straining at unseen cords. 

“ I know I shouldn’t enjoy yer books if they made me 
lik q you!” She would not yield to him. Her words 
were independent enough, full enough of self-assertion, 
but there was a false ring of bravado in them which she 
recognized helplessly. 

“Ay, you are honest,” repeated Hulse. 

“And you are — ” she began with a desperate deter- 
mination to fling off the nightmare of power he wielded 
over her, but he interrupted her with an adagio drawl : 

“Ah, don’t try to tell me what I am. You don’t know 
— you can’t have the least idea. I may be guilty of a 
poem — did you notice my library ? or of the unconven- 
tional love of Don Carlos for his mother. Who can tell ? 
Or, I may be a murderer, since murderers are as plentiful 
in California as Doctors of Divinity in New England.” 

Billy, who had several times been on the point of inter- 
posing and had been as often waved off by Maria, came 
forward, very white about the lips, and said : 

“Hain’t ye had ’nough o’ his jeerin’ yit. Mariar ? Let’s 
go now. Come ! I’ll settle it with him to-morrer. ” 

“ I don’t see ’t they’s anything to settle,” she muttered, 
still plucking at her apron. 

“I’ll settle it with him to-morrer,” was Billy’s quiet 
iteration. 


234 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


Maria turned from him to Hulse. 

“I wish 't we hadn’t come here!” she cried, with a 
despairing movement of her hands which was like an 
appeal for help. 

In the strained condition of affairs she forgot for the 
time the rebellious serfdom to which Hulse’s presence 
always subjected her, and thought only of the danger of 
allowing Billy to leave the place in anger. The urgent 
need of actiondoosened the bonds of self-conscibusness and 
she was free again. Hulse’s mastery over her was but a 
mastery of her imagination ; freed from this she could 
act with independence in the line of duty. She could 
meet him as an equal by forgetting.herself. A quick re- 
solve flashed into her mind, and in carrying it out she 
arose superior to his extortionate demands upon her obe- 
dience. 

“ Billy,” she cried, suddenly “ ye’ve forgot the drink o’ 
water we came for. I’m thirsty. ” 

Billy took down a tin cup which hung under the little 
square window and went out to the brook. 

Maria turned to Hulse with a slight lifting of her head. 
A change in her face expressed the subsidence of self- 
assertion, but her glance was freighted with an over- 
mastering, unselfish fear. 

“I don't want ye ’n’ Billy to fight,’* she said in a pas- 
sionate, eager tone. “’N’ that’s what it’ll come to. I 
know it. Don’t ye see how mad he is ! ’* 

“Does he want to fight?” asked Hulse, with his eyes 
upon her. 

“He’ll insist on it — I know him so well ! ye know him 
yerself. I want ye to make it right with him.” 

“ Make it right with him ? ” 

“Yes. Tell him ye hain’t meant nothin’ by what ye’ve 
said ’n' done.” 

“And why should I do that ? 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


235 


“ For yer own sake.” 

Hulse smiled curiously. 

4 4 He cannot harm me,” he said. 

“ If he fights with ye it means — death ! ” 

“Death? ” Hulse’s tone was bitterly sarcastic. 

“Death to one or both ! ” 

“ He cannot harm me,” repeated Hulse. 

“ Fer my sake, then ! ” 

“ How will our quarreling harm you ?” 

She met his glance quite frankly. 

“Billy loves me,” she said, simply. 

“And you ” 

“I care more fer ’ipn ’n I can find words to tell. He’s 
the best, the only friend I’ve got in all the world. Ye 
know how such quarrels end here. ’N’ I don’t want no 
blood spilt — his’n nor your’n.” She shivered. 

Hulse was regarding her with narrowed eyes. But 
Billy’s entrance at this moment put an end to further 
speech on either side. 

“ Here’s the water, Mariar,” said Billy, holding the cup 
toward her. 

She did not speak nor move nor take her eyes from 
Hulse’s face. She did not seem to breathe. 

“See!” repeated Billy, touching her hand with the 
cold tin. 

“ I don’t want the water ! ” she cried roughly, drawing 
away. “ I ain’t thirsty — now.” 

“ W’y — ” began Billy. 

* ‘ I don’t want it, I say ! ” she repeated in a high, angry 
voice, pushing the cup from her and spilling its contents 
on the floor. “ I don’t want it ’n’ I won’t have it ! ’’ 

Billy shook out the few remaining drops and hung the 
cup on its nail under the window ; then he stood with 
compressed lips, waiting her next movement. She was 
still looking at Hulse, who was smiling sarcastically. 


236 IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 

Was he indifferent to her anxiety, or was he enjoying it ? 

In any case, she could endure the strain of his presence 
no longer. She turned to Billy with a passionate low cry. 

“Take me away!” she breathed, grasping his arm 
and drawing him toward the door. 

Billy loosened her hand very gently and pushed her 
a little to one side, holding her hand in his. 

“ I’ll go in a minute,” he said, in a hard, quiet tone. 
“ But fust I want to know what he’s been sayin’ to ye 
while I was out there fer the water. If he’s said any- 
thing — ” 

“ I have said nothing immodest,” interrupted Hulse, 
with his slow smile. 

Again Maria tried to draw Billy toward the door, and 
again he held her gently back. 

“ Has he said anything to ye, Mariar, ’t ain’t straight 
’n’ fair ? ” 

“ No — no — nothin’, on my word, Billy. Come away ! 
See, it’s gittin’ late, ’n’ they’s a long walk afore us. 
Come ! ” 

Billy’s face relaxed somewhat. 

“ I didn’t think it o’ Hulse ’t he’d openly insult a lady,” 
he said. “ But they’s suthin’ wrong — they’s suthin' 
wrong. I can’t rightly make out what ’tis jes’ now, but — 
I’ll come back V settle this biz’ness with ye to-morrer, 
Hulse. I don’t fight in the presence o’ ladies.” 

“ As you like ! ” was the imperturbable answer. 

“ Let us go ! ” pleaded Maria. 

Billy held her back so that he faced Hulse squarely. 
His blue eyes flashed like steel. 

“ I can’t make out the meanin’ o’ most o’ what ye’ve 
said to-day, Hulse, so ’t I can’t bear no grudge ag’in’ yei 
naked words. I ain’t much on dictionary slang, nohow; 
but I’ve got feelin’s the same as you, ’n’ .so has Mariar ; 
n’ I tell ye plainly ye need a lesson in manners. The 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


2 37 

tone o’ yer voice needs cultivatin', ’n’ to-morrer I’ll come 
up ’n’ give ye a lesson. Come, Mariar, we’ll go now.” 

But Hulse stepped in between them and the door so 
that they could not pass. Maria felt as if an iron hand 
were at her throat. She could not move for the nightmare 
of fear that benumbed her. Was the fight to take place 
now, in her presence ? 

“ Bling,” said Hulse in his colorless tone, “have you 
any reason to believe that I am a coward ? ” 

“ No,” replied Billy with ready generosity, “ I know 
ye’re a brave man. I’ve seen ye venture yer life where 
the bravest would a-faltered. I ’member up there to the 
American Mine — ” 

Hulse lifted his hand in languid protest. 

“ No matter. Do you believe I would fail to meet you 
to-morrow through fear ? ” 

“ No. I hain’t no reason to think so.” 

“ And yet I shall not meet you.” 

He glanced carelessly toward Maria, who was leaning 
forward as if to catch the words before they left his lips. 

“ Billy,” said Hulse, holding out both hands, “ I have 
no wish to quarrel with you. We have been comrades 
here a long time, and I like you as much as I am capable 
of liking any man. Why should it not continue ? If my 
behavior to-day has displeased you I am sorry, and I can 
excuse myself only by asking you to remember what you 
have often said to my face — that I am a queer, incalcu- 
lable man. You know some people call me insane.” 
His voice, which had till now been as regular and mo- 
notonous as if repeating a mathematical formula — Maria 
wondered how such genuine words could be uttered in 
such an indifferent tone — became charged with momen- 
tary feeling, “ and sometimes I half believe they are 
right. I have no wish to quarrel with you, Billy. The 
fault h^s been mine, Let us be friends,” 


238 IN' THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 

Billy yielded his hands, but did not return the pressure 
of the other. 

“The offense is ag’in’ Mariar,” he said in a softened 
tone. “ I’ll let her speak fer me.” 

There was a mist before her eyes as she answered in a 
quick, agitated voice : 

“Then I say, by all means be friends.” And she • 
laughed almost hysterically. 

The two men shook hands in silence. 

“ And now you are at liberty to finish your idyl in your 
own good time and way, ’’said Hulse. “ And since we 
are good friends again, let me give you a word of advice : 
if you care for each other — and I suppose you think you 
do — don’t be too much together. You’ll find that absence 
.exalts more than merit. Take allopathic doses of sep- 
aration ; they are the best preventive of contempt ! ” 

“ Come,” said Maria, drawing her arm through Billy’s, 
“let’s go now.” Hulse seemed determined to be derisive 
till the last, and she feared that Billy’s half-appeased ie- 
sentment might be roused again. She felt thankful for a 
great deliverance and longed to hurry away lest it be 
withdrawn. She pulled Billy after her through the door, 
and Hulse followed a little way behind. At sight of him 
the flock of doves fell like masses of snow from the roof 
to his feet. Maria looked back once after she had passed 
the opening in the rocks which led to the cabin and saw 
that the birds had settled upon his head and shoulders 
and extended arms. He was holding one close to his 
face and smoothing its snowy plumage with caressing 
fingers. 

“ I never seen Hulse act so nasty afore,” muttered Billy 
after a long silence. “ I had no idee a human critter 
could put sech a vile sound into his voice.” 

“ But it’s all right now,” said Maria, eager that Billy 
should feel quite satisfied. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


239 


“ Oh, I reckon so. I ’most wish it wa’n’t, he acted so 
d — n mean. Bat a feller can’t fight after the way he 
’pologized. ” 

“ O’ course not.” 

“ Well, let it go. I wonder what could a-upset him so? ” 

“Ye told me wunst ’t he hated wimmin. Mebbe it was 
the sight o’ me ’t done it.” 

Billy gave a long whistle. 

“ That’s jest it ! ” he cried, slapping his thigh. “D’ye 
know, Mariar, sometimes I’ve thought ’t mebbe he was 
disapp’inted in love in his younger days, ’n’ it sort o’ 
soured ’im ag’in’ the sex. I swear, it looks like it, don’t 
it, now ? ” 

“ Yes,” answered Maria faintly. 

“ Poor feller?’ said Billy, compassionately. “ Poor 
feller ! He must a-thought a heap o’ her to let it drive 
’im off ’ere in sech a upset way. ’N' what a queer ring 
he can put into them big words o’ his’n ! I can’t alius 
understan’ the words, but the meanin’ o’ his voice ain’t 
good. He don’t talk like that when we’re alone ; come 
to think, I reckon he lets me do most o’ the talkin’. But 
suthin’ in his words to-day riled me. I can feel it, but it’s 
’s hard to put my finger on ’s one o’ them ’Frisco fleas.” 

Maria laughed nervously. 

“ We mustn’t jedge his tone too ha’sh when we can’t 
make out the words,” she said. “ Mebbe the words 
meant better ’n the voice made ’em seem.” 

“ His eyes said ’s much ’s his voice did,” continued 
Billy, meditatively. “ I never seen sech a eye in a man’s 
head. I never reely noticed till to-day, but it’s like the 
open back-door o’ hell.” 

They went on in silence for some time, both grave and 
thoughtful. Billy did not try to talk after these first few 
words. Even the utterance of these had been an effort, 
and he was not in a mood to exert himself further. 


240 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


The evident hollowness of Hulse’s unexpected, undesired 
apology caused him to wonder keenly why that contra- 
dictory man had proffered it. Not from cowardice, Billy 
was sure, for it had often been said of Hulse that he 
seemed careless of danger and eager for death. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


241 


CHAPTER XXIX. 

Mr. Pugsley lighted his pipe and sat down by the 
window for a comfortable smoke. Things were going 
well with him ; he was getting on in the world in just 
the manner he had always desired to get on, — he was 
doing nothing, and there seemed no necessity for him to 
do anything in all the infinity of time that, was to come. 
The laundry business had proved a success. He had 
enough to eat, — boiled chicken was an event of almost 
daily occurrence in the Pugsley family in these days, — 
and Maria even furnished him with a little spending- 
money besides, — enough to keep himself in a condition 
of sunny good-nature about the house. Perhaps Maria 
had an eye to the latter convenience when she counted 
out his financial allowance every morning ; Ephraim did 
not know nor care. The only fault he could find with 
Maria was that thus far she had come to no definite 
“ settlement ” with Billy ; and that Billy was anxious for 
a speedy and favorable answer to his suit, Ephraim had 
assured himself by personal investigation. 

It was rumored that half the miners in and about the 
camp of Havilah had taken to wearing white shirts for the 
express purpose of having an excuse to pay a weekly 
visit to the Pugsley cabin. The unencumbered masculine 
element in the community declared that Maria’s ways 
were “fetchin”’ and that Maud Eliza’s jokes were worth 
listening to, if for no other reason, because she enjoyed 
them so much herself. Maria was satisfied with her income, 
and worked ceaselessly, day and night ; Maud Eliza, too, 
had suddenly become more serious, and had settled down 
to business with a feminine adaptability which recognized 


242 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


as an ultimate aim the charms of hitherto unattainable 
calico gowns with exaggerated ruffles of an ideal fulness. 
As for Mrs. Pugsley, she partook of the growing pros- 
perity of the family. She looked much less moist than 
formerly, though her partial dryness, *it must be confessed, 
seemed too superficial to resist even a slight relapse of 
good fortune. To-day she lay on the lounge, — Maria's 
first money had been invested in a second-hand lounge 
for her mother, — in calm contemplation of a long-delayed 
elegance which she felt to be picturesque, indeed, though 
remotely so compared with the magnificence into which 
it might have developed had metamorphosis set in earlier 
in life, before she had ceased, for all practical purposes, 
to be longer accounted a Swipes. However, there was 
no denying that it was something like a lady to lie on the 
lounge all day in a new calico gown which luxuriated in 
a flounce a half yard wide. But Mrs. Pugsley's great pride 
and glory was a white muslin cap with a frightened- 
looking pink bow on the front, which she had insisted on 
as the exact counterpart of one that “ Ma Swipes ” always 
wore. Mrs. Pugsley’s supreme longing now was for a 
spotted collar with a blue stripe around it, and a pair of 
cardinal stockings, after which she could feel that the 
final goal of her life had been attained, and that nothing 
remained for her but to go on contemplating her surprising 
elegance until the time when she should be gathered to 
her fathers. 

As Maria and Maud Eliza stood at the table this after- 
noon busily ironing, Mrs. Pugsley had ample time and 
opportunity to view her own gown and theirs with a 
comparative, diagnostic eye. All were from the same 
piece of calico, — Maria had bought a whole bolt cheap 
because a yard or so was damaged, — but Mrs. Pugsley 
cherished a decided preference for the make and fit of her 
pwn. Maria’s certainly wrinkled about the shoulders, 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


243 

and Maud Elizas was so tight that it gaped between the 
buttons. Mrs. Pugsley’s eyes being in front of her, she 
could form no conception of the phenomenal flatness her 
own garment gave to her back when she occasionally 
stood up to readjust herself, nor could she perceive that 
it was shorter behind than before and was very scant of 
gathers in the back and very full of them on the hips. 
Had her training been of the sort to develop a power of 
impersonal generalization, she might have characterized 
the toilets of all three as finery which aspiring poverty 
had a hand in making ; but in the novel consciousness of 
new clothes, she felt no interest beyond her advance 
from old standards, and rested calmly in the belief that 
her suddenly acquired raiment represented the ultimatum 
of opulence and good taste. Mr. Pugsley himself from 
his seat by the window occasionally glanced toward his 
family with a proprietary expression of approval, and 
then looked away thoughtfully, imagining a glorious 
future in which all things — even a plug hat for himself— 
seemed possible and probable. 

“Well, ole woman/' said he, cheerfully, “this is 
suthin’ like livin', now, ain't it ? Ye 'n' both the gals 
dressed up to the Queen’s taste 'n* enjoyin’ yerselves, 
’n’ me a settin' 'ere a-smokin’ my pipe 's easy 's pie ! 
This is bloomin', this is ! I ain’t no objections to lettin’ 
this last forever ! ” 

Mrs. Pugsley’s secret satisfaction in the contemplation 
of her gown faded instantly. Having accustomed herself 
to the belief that she possessed all the diseases of human- 
ity, an insinuation that she might be enjoying herself 
roused all her querulous resentment into activity. 

“ Oh, yes,” she quavered, with her old look of super- 
ficial patience. “I’m perfeckly well. Who ’s heard me 
complain ? / 'm alius well. Why don’t ye set me to 

makin’ garden? They ain’t nothin’ the matter o’ me! ” 


244 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


And she sighed, wiping away an imaginary tear on hei 
cap-string. 

“ They’s people as don’t know they feel bad ’less they 
hear theirselves howl,” remarked Ephraim. “Ye orter 
feel good in that new gownd o’ your’n.” 

“I do — I do ! ” cried Mrs. Pugsley, with hysterical 
sobs. ‘ ‘ Don’t ye see how cheerful I be — how grateful I 
be ? What wooman could be more so with the pains a-run- 
nin’ through er like burnin’ fire? Oh, my side ! oh, my 
liver ! ” 

“ Lor’, dad, let ’er alone,” said Maria, testing the heat 
of her flat-iron with her moistened finger. “ She’s been 
feelin’ bad s’ long ’t it’s got to be a habit now. Let ’er be ! ” 

“ Even my darter goes back on me,” whimpered Mrs. 
Pugsley, shaking her head drearily. “ I stan’ alone ! ” 

“ Mebbe if she’d take to drinkin’,” said Maria, in a 
voice which Ephraim thought a trifle too significant, 
“ she’d be cheerfuller. Hadn’t ye better persuade ’er, 
dad ?” 

Mrs. Pugsley seemed to consider the proposition seri- 
ously. 

“ Raw whiskey was alius too hard fer my neck,” she 
complained, feebly. “ ’Tain’t no use to try to keep cheer- 
ful that way. I never could stan’ it, not even when dad 
kep’ his place there to the Bar, ’n’ I was a gal then, too, 
with a reg’lar Swipes stummick ’t was ekal to anything.” 

“ I ain’t been drinkin’ heavy lately, Maria,” said 
Ephraim. “Ye talk like I'd been runnin’ over my ’low- 
ance, ’n’ I ain’t, not wunst.” 

“ Oh, I know that,” was the answer. 

“A man like me ” began Ephraim. 

Maria laughed. 

“A man lik q you!” she cried. “Oh, dad, that’s too 
good. The Lord was only jokin’ when he made ye, dad ; 
He didn’t intend ye fer a man ! ” 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


245 

Maud Eliza slammed her flat-iron down on the table 
and snorted. 

“Aman like me," proceeded Ephraim, choosing to dis- 
regard these things, “has stren’th o’ mind ’nough to keep 
in bounds — alius in bounds. They’s bounds to every- 
thing, ’n’ I alius keep inside o’ 'em, my dear. That’s the 
kind o' hollyhock / be ! " 

He emptied his pipe by striking the inverted bowl sev- 
eral times against the heel of his boot ; then -filled it again 
with whittlings from a plug of chewing tobacco which he 
always carried in his pocket. 

“ Mariar,” he said, when he was puffing comfortably 
again, “ I want to ask ye jes’ one question. D’ye mind? ” 

“Oh, ask away," she answered. “ I needn’t answer 
’less I like." 

“ What I want to know is," said Ephraim, in the tone 
of one who is willing to retract his words if they are not 
agreeable, “ what I want to know is, what be ye a-goin’ 
to do with Billy Bling ?.’’ 

“ What be I a-goin’ to do with ’im ?’’ 

Finding that his question was not resented as an unpar- 
donable liberty, the head of the family went on with more 
independence : 

“Them was my words — what be ye a-goin’ to do with 
Billy Bling? Be ye a-goin’ to take 'im, or be ye a-goin’ ' 
to give ’im the shake ? Be ye a-goin’ to let ’im keep on 
cornin’ here till kingdom come without gittin’ at a settle- 
ment, or be ye a-goin’ to marry ’im ’n’ settle down like a 
gal o’ sense ? ’’ 

“ It’s his house, ’n’ I reckon he can come s often 's he 
wants to. / ain’t a-goin’ to turn ’im out.” 

“What I want to know is," said Ephraim, more impres- 
sively, wheeling himself about in his chair and facing her, 

“ be ye a-goin’ to marry ’im or no ? That’s what I want 
to know." 


246 /A T THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 

He replaced his pipe in his mouth with the resolve that, 
as long as Maria made no objection to his taking an inter- 
est in her affairs, he would continue to perform his duty 
as a father. 

Maria was silent. 

“ Billy’s a fine young feller,” continued Ephraim, tak- 
ing his pipe from his mouth again and emphasizing his 
words by repeatedly dabbing it at her. “ ’N’ he’s got the 
rocks, too. They ain’t no better prospecks nowheres in 
this deestrick ’n his’n. Scripter don’t advertise no better 
gold fer the ancient land o’ Havilah ’n what’s found right 
on Billy’s claim.” 

“Well!” said Maria. “Whose Bible ’ve you been 
s’prisin’ by lookin’ into it ? ” 

“ Nobody’s ! ” cried Ephraim, triumphantly. “I heerd 
’bout it down to Boosey’s. Ye see, that’s the sort o’ thing 
we talk over, down there. One ole feller ’t used to be a 
parson som’ers back in the States, they say, was talkin’ 
’bout Billy’s claim, t’other day, ’n’ them was his words : 

‘ D — n it ! ’ says he, ‘ the gold off ’m that claim beats the 
gold o’ Scriptural Havilah all to thunder ! ’ Says I, ‘ I 
didn’t know they was any sech thing as a Havilah in 
Scripter.’ ‘Well,’ says he, ‘they was, ’n’ the Bible says 
the gold o’ that land was good.’ Them was his very 
words. ’N’ now ye can see the ’vantage o’ stayin’ aroun’ 
’n’ hearin’ what’s goin’ on. ” 

“Yes, I see,” said Maria. “ Have ye got any more o’ 
them air flamin’ remarks to make ? ” 

Here Maud Eliza tittered disagreeably. 

“I wish ’t ye wouldn’t do that, Maud Eliza,” said 
Ephraim, with mild persuasion. “It sounds like a ole 
hen ’t’s scared.” 

“It’s the chicken we had fer dinner,” giggled the girl in 
explanation. “I et so much o”t I can hardly keep from 
cacklin’ all the time 1 ” 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


*47 

“ Seems to me like ye’ve got less understan’in’ ’n’ 
usual,” said Ephraim, displeased. 

“Oh, no, I hain’t ! ” declared Maud Eliza, who scin- 
tillated with high spirits this afternoon. “I’ve got the 
usual ’mount o’ understan’in’, plus one corn.” 

At this retort everybody laughed except Mrs. Pugsley, 
who groaned. 

“ It ’ud be a good thing fer all o’ us,” continued Eph- 
raim after their mirth had subsided, “if ye could make 
up yer mind in favor o’ Billy. He’d make ye a good 
husban’ ” 

“ When I git ready fer the great * I Am,’ I’ll prob’ly find 
’im ’thout any help from you,” interrupted Maria, but not 
angrily. And Ephraim ventured to proceed : 

“ ’N’ he wouldn’t be mean towards yer ma ’n’ the rest 
o’ us. He’d be willin’ to pervide fer us han’sim ” 

“ Ye git’nough to eat ’n’ drink, don’t ye?” asked Maria, 
with a little impatience. 

“ Oh, I ain’t no call to complain o’ that,” answered 
Ephraim hastily. “ That’s all right — perfeckly right. 
What I want is to see ye settled comf table. ” 

“ ’N’ yerself settled comf’table along o’ me,” added 
Maria, with some bitterness. 

But Ephraim pretended not to notice. 

“ A wooman ’t ain’t married ain’t no good in this world. 
She’s like half a punkin seed — she won’t never ’mount to 
nothin’. Ye orter think o’ it serious, Mariar. Ye’ll never 
git another such a chance. I hope ye hain’t got no other 
notions into yer head.” 

She flushed hotly, but did not bid him to hold his tongue 
as he expected her to do. 

“ I ain’t a critter o’ notions,” she muttered ; “ye know 
that. I don’t want to be dependent on nobody. It’s a 
pore hen ’t can’t scratch fer herself. ” 

“ Yes, but I can never be sure o’ what’s cornin’ to ye, 
Mariar. Ye’ve been so sober lately ” 


248 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


“ That’s ’cause I ain’t had no ammunition to fire with. 

“ So sober lately ’t I’ve jes’ felt all the time like ye was 
secretly goin’ ag’in’ yer own int’rests ’n’ the int’rests o’ 
the hull fam’ly. How’s a man to know what’s a-goin’ to 
git into a wooman’s head one minnit after another ? A 
man can never tell what’s a-goin’ on in the nex’ room, ’n’ 
who can say what thoughts go frolickin’ aroun’ per- 
misc’us under a young wooman’s skull ? Lord ! like s 
not they’s some other feller this minnit ’t ye’re sweet on.” 

Maria went on ironing but her face was burning. 

“Some wuthless chap, mebbe, ’t ’ll work ye like a ole 
hoss ’n’ live off ’n yer wages.” Ephraim suddenly recol- 
lected that this was dangerous ground and stopped short. 
“I’d hate to see ye make a bad match, Mariar,”he added, 
“after havin’ a chance to make sech a good ’un.” 

“ Ye needn’t worry, dad, ’’she said, very quietly. “I’ll 
marry whoever I like, I can assure ye o’ that — if I can git 
him. ’Tain’t ieryou to be callin’ folks lazy ’n’ mean, no- 
how. Fer myself, it takes so much o’ my time to keep 
myself clean ’t I ain’t got no time to go aroun’ advisin’ 
my neighbors to wash theirselves, ’n’ if ye’ll jes! keep yer- 
self decent, I reckon my future husban’ ’ll git along nicely 
’thout any interference o’ your’n.” 

Her tone was so mild that Ephraim thought it safe to 
appear offended. 

“ I reckon a father ’s got a right to advise his own 
darter,” he said. “ ’N’ even if he hain’t, the law o’ the 
land ’lows a man to speak when he feels like it. It’s a 
free country ” 

“ It’s a free country fer everybody to pay their way 
through,” snickered Maud Eliza, determined to be face- 
tious till the last. 

Mrs. Pugsley here gave over a renewed contemplation 
of her toilet, and remarked, weakly : 

“ I don’t see why Mariar can’t marry ’im to wunst ’n' 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


249 


git it over with. That’s the way / done, ’n’ I was more 
o’ a Swipes ’n’ she is. Ye’ve got to marry sometime, no 
matter what goes afore or after. ’N’ it’s easier ’n it looks. 
All ye’ve got to do ’s to stan’ up afore the squire ’n’ say 
yes to everything he asks ye, ’n’ there ye be ! ” 

Maria made no reply, but when Ephraim started on the 
subject again she told him so decidedly she had heard 
enough of it that he wisely concluded to say no more* 

That evening Billy came in and asked Maria to go with 
him for another walk by the river. Ephraim sat at the 
window and watched the two young people as they dis- 
appeared among the cottonwoods. 

“.Mariar ’ll have to settle the matter to-night,” he said 
to Maud Eliza and his wife. “ I could see it in his eye. 
’Sides that, Billy told me to-day that was what he was 
cornin’ down fer. Ye* two wimmin can go to bed when 
ye like, but I’m goin’ to wait till that gal comes back if 
it ’s till midnight.” 

It was quite late when her step ascended the veranda, 
and he knew that she was alone. Billy had evidently not 
even accompanied her to the gate. The moon flared like 
a Pentecostal flame on the hills ; there was no light in the 
room, but a slant flood of moonlight poured in at one of 
the windows and fell full upon her face as she passed 
through the room. She looked haggard, almost deathly 
in the wan light, and her eyes were red as if with long 
weeping. 

Ephraim stirred uneasily to attract her attention, and 
she, as if understanding the movement, turned toward 
him with her face in shadow. She looked at him a 
moment in silence and then said, almost tenderly : 

“ Have ye been waitin’ fer me all this time, dad ? Well, 
I’ve settled it. I’ve told ’im I couldn’t marry ’im — never. 
’N’ now I want ye never to say ’nother word to me 
’bout it.” 


250 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


CHAPTER XXX. 

To a baby’ eyes I suppose this earth appears very much 
as it did in primordial times, “ without form and void.” 
And sometimes, later on in life, after long battling with the 
social elements has upset our nerves and dizzied our 
brains, after the sighing insufficiency of everything has 
culminated in some particular disappointment which 
wrenches us out of harmony with our surroundings, we 
are resolved, so to speak, into our elements, and presently 
find ourselves in the midst of the evolution of new worlds. 

The process of reconstruction is likely to result in a 
madman or a genius. I am aware that this view of the 
matter seems to popularize, and, after a manner, set a 
premium on insanity, (for which, Heaven knows ! there 
is no need), but at second thought the intelligent reader 
can hardly fail to discover a solution of this difficulty in 
the well-known fact that one-half the world considers the 
other half foolish, while the half so vilified revenges itself 
by circulating wild stories which go to prove that its vili- 
fier is insane. Probably most of us would object to our 
neighbor’s estimate of our common-sense, and as a per- 
sonal estimate would by no means be accepted by our 
neighbor, we are constrained to let the matter rest where 
we find it, and, by refraining from poetry, avoid a rep- 
utation for utter imbecility. 

In the matter of disappointments the softening influence 
of science is noticeable in these days. After longer as- 
tronomical observation than would seem necessary, the 
average man finds himself on the verge of tearful melan- 
choly on discovering that, in spite of hope’s flattering tale, 
the moon is not made of green cheese ; that, were it so 


IN THE VALLEY OF II AVI L AH, 


251 


constituted, no mortal could by any possible means 
obtain as much as a bite of it ; and that, even were it an 
easy thing to satisfy this celestial soul-hunger, a most 
distressing state of the stomach would probably ensue, — 
the pernicious qualities of green cheese being but one of 
many unforgivable oversights in a creation which often 
refuses to adapt means to ends. Thus science offers 
alleviations for the wounds of the spirit by teaching indi- 
rectly that what we cannot get we are more comfortable 
without getting. 

A lunar disappointment, traced through its various 
stages as above, may be easily construed to mean a love 
disappointment, certain indefinable relations having been 
established between lovers and the moon ever since love 
and the moon were in a rudimentary state : it being un- 
derstood that oysters and other beings of mild intelligence 
were the chief exponents of the tender passion in remote 
ages as at the present day. 

But in a simple, untutored nature like Billy Bling’s, 
havihg no powers of philosophic generalization, capable 
of strong, loving, unreasoning emotions, containing none 
of the starch of scientific deduction, there is nothing, as 
in the case of us wise astronomers who crave green 
cheese, to stiffen the faculties at the moment of dis- 
appointment and collapse, and prevent certain mental 
disorders which flavor oddly of poetry, madness, and 
healthy human sentiment. And we wise people, who 
have doubtless never done anything foolish or mad or 
human, smile and sigh over it and call it very pitiful, 
never suspecting that what we pity as weakness may be 
such genuine strength as the heaped-up refinement of the 
world cannot balance in the scale of magnanimity. 

The peculiarity of Billy's mental condition after that 
decisive moonlight meeting with Maria manifested itself 
most strangely in the readiness with which he stifled the 


252 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA II. 


pain of his great disappointment and converted his love 
for her into an overflowing energy of unselfish friendship. 
He went from that interview stunned like one who has 
fallen from a tower. Several times he stopped on the way 
home to rest and look about him and try to understand 
what had happened. He could remember that she had 
said she did not love him as a wife should love her hus- 
band, and that she could never be his. It had all been 
made plain of late, she added. The consciousness of 
irremediable rejection was with him from the first, like 
the consciousness of his wretched, broken life ; but that 
was not what wrought most keenly on his thoughts. 
What he could not understand was her ambigupus words 
and actions. Shfe had been very kind to him — he remem- 
bered her kindness not only as a pain to himself, but as 
a proof that she could never care for him as he wished. 

“ Billy, Billy ! ” she had cried, and he remembered how 
the moonlight rested on her white face, “if ye knowed — • 
if ye only knowed, ye wouldn’t blame me, ye couldn’t 
have the heart ! ” 

She had gone on to tell him brokenly that she, too, was 
miserable, unutterably miserable, — that she wished she 
were dead and out of all the trouble that had come upon 
her. He could never forget how she said that she wished 
she were dead. She looked so white and yet so pas- 
sionate — there was something about her that chilled him 
and made -him think that she was already dead and had 
opened her cold lips in a sudden passion of sorrow to tell 
him of her grief. He could not question her then, and he 
would not have done so if he could. He had left her 
without a word ; it was all that he could do. 

As he sat on a stone by the way that night, he had tried 
to think of it collectedly, but his thoughts were rambling 
and incoherent — sometimes of himself, oftener of some 
irrelevant detail of her face or voice. He could only utter 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


253 


brokenly, “Poor Mariar ! ” or repeat in a vacant way, 
“ I wish ’t I knowed — I wish ’t I knowed ! ” He could 
hardly get farther than that simple wish. And then he 
thought feebly of what the future might do. Perhaps she 
would tell him her sorrow if he urged her, sometime; he 
would like to help her and see her happy, even if he were 
always miserable himself. How could a girl like her be 
miserable, he wondered ; she had in her all that is nec- 
essary to life and happiness in others. It was strange 
that she could be unhappy in herself. 

He rose and walked on up the path. The moon was 
shining and all the stars were out. All about him the 
sweet, soft grass of the valley rose to his knees, and he 
could see the flowers everywhere in the moonlight. He 
did not care for them now any more than he cared for the 
stars in the sky ; they were all equally remote, imper- 
sonal, unimpressive. He remembered as in a dream that 
he had gathered some blue-flags for Maria when he passed 
down this path between the foothills and the river earlier 
in the evening, but she had hardly noticed them when he 
gave them to her, only pulling them absently to pieces 
and letting them fall upon the grass. That was before he 
asked her for her decision — ages ago, he thought, when 
he was young and hopeful. He pulled a h'andful of the 
delicate blossoms now and crushed them against his palm, 
then let them drop one by one. They had no meaning 
for him, these petalled histones of life ; if Mana*did not 
care for them, of what use were they in the world ? ” 

Well, it was all ended now, the hope and the longing. 
He walked forward with bowed head, feeling a vague pity 
for his wounded self, such as he had once felt in holding 
a broken-winged bird in his hands and watching its forced 
resignation to inactive pain after a season of aspiration 
and vivid joy. His sorrow seemed quite close to him, and 
yet very far away. All ended ! He repeated the words 


254 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


hollowly, dully, listening to them as he might listen in a 
trance to the clods falling upon his own coffin. It was 
the end of all things to him — he might go on existing from 
day to day, but all real life and happiness were over for- 
ever. Not that he cared so much for himself — he could 
bear anything but the knowledge that Maria was crushed 
beneath the weight of some secret sorrow. He could 
have cried aloud to Heaven out of sympathy for her. His 
own trouble was too hopeless to manifest itself aggres- 
sively in cries of lamentation. It lay under all thought 
and feeling like a recognized, insidious disease. 

He had hoped for so much — he had looked forward with 
such joyous expectation to possessing all that he really 
cared for in the world ; not because he had ever believed 
himself worthy of Marias regard — his reverent love had 
always placed her infinitely beyond him — but because he 
had cherished a wish-begotten faith that she might some- 
how care for him in spite of his faults — might regard these 
faults with womanly pity, and try to cure him of them 
and make him more like her. What might he not become, 
with her always at his side, aiding, encouraging, admon- 
ishing, as he felt that she alone had power to do ! Love, 
like the fruit-tree whose seed is in itself, has in it all the 
highest possibilities of existence. It is a glorious thing — 
it is prophetic of ever-increasing glory. And even if 
Maria could not care for him now, he would be willing to 
wait if she would only let him hope, only let him believe 
that she would finally turn to him. But she had left no 
chance for him to delude himself further ; her words had 
been decisive, and her manner had been even more deci- 
sive than her words. 

So, by the time Billy reached his cabin that night, all 
sensation of personal grief was merged in the greater 
trouble of knowing that Maria was suffering and might 
need his help. His own longings had already receded 


hV THE VALLEY OF HA VILAH. 


2 55 

into the background, forming a setting, as it were, for her 
all-important sorrow. It did not matter about himself. 
He deserved no better ; but she — he thought of her with 
a yearning which was almost pain. He longed to do 
something for her, to carry all her troubles for her, to 
soothe her, comfort her and let her walk lightly through 
life, as was becoming, among the flowers and in the sun- 
shine. It did not matter what happened to him. He felt 
that his dead hopes were finally buried. Let them go ! 
What did it profit to think of them, to mourn over them, 
to try to resuscitate them ? 

He did not lie down that night nor .sleep at all. Most 
of the time he sat quite still, crouched in the little door- 
way, thinking, thinking. Once in a while he went a short 
distance down the gulch, but came back directly and sat 
down in his old position, like a prisoner who has walked 
the length of his chain and feels the uselessness of a 
further attempt at freedom. But gradually his ideas be- 
came clearer. He could keep his mind on Maria’s troubles 
quite steadily without thinking of himself, except as a 
possible means of helping her. He had no future — that 
was hers. He saw no pathos in a vision he had of him- 
self going out to his work day after day, hopelessly living 
a star-crossed life which must wander from the darkness 
of the world into the darkness of the grave — a cheerless 
pilgrimage. He felt that he could neither conceal nor 
parade his hopeless love. If people guessed the truth, as 
they might easily do, it was well ; if not, better. Maria 
would always know. He would hide nothing, reveal 
nothing. The scars of life are honorable scars whose 
wearing shames no man. He felt nothing of the grand- 
eur of renunciation in what he did — he only knew that 
Maria willed it so, and that was enough. He did not 
philosophize ; he aould not have done so on a less per- 
sonal subject. And this was just as well for him, since it 


256 IN THE VALLEY OF HA VI L AN. 

is a well-known fact that philosophy is a balm for every* 
body’s.wounds but one’s own. 

So the night passed and the morning came, and Billy 
took his pick and shovel and went out to work as usual. 
He cared nothing for his promising claim now, but he 
must do something, and digging was the nearest thing at 
hand. His long night’s watch had not been entirely with- 
out results. He half suspected the real cause of Maria’s 
sorrow. Perhaps she loved some other man — doubtless 
that was it ! Billy did not mind that particularly now. 
She ought to marry the man she cared for. Nobody was 
too good for her. At any rate, there was no hope iorhim, 
and why should they both be unhappy? Perhaps she 
would tell him all about it if he asked her ? She was sure 
to consider him her friend and trust him. And perhaps, 
if she would tell him, he could help her ? However, until 
she saw fit to give him her confidence he could do 
nothing. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


257 


CHAPTER XXXI. 

Several days passed, and Billy became almost cheerful 
in thinking of Maria and planning for her future. He 
even smiled a little one evening as he passed down the 
gulch and out into the open valley, assuring himself that 
she would be glad to see him after so long an absence. 
She would be glad to see him, he felt sure, for she liked 
him as a friend if nothing more. 

‘ ‘ ’N she needs a friend in this ’ere trouble o’ her ’n, 
whatever ’tis,” he said to himself, passing down the green 
path in the moonlight. “ * N’ I’ll stan’ by ’er ’n’ help ’er’n’ 
be a brother to ’er, ’n I’ll learn to be contented with that.” 

His sudden appearance at the door of the Pugsley cabin 
must have elicited a scream from a fashionable young 
lady whose digestion has been refined by a diet of French 
candy and daily piano practice continued through a term 
of years, but as Maria was unacquainted with these means 
of painting the lily of modern womanhood, and especially 
as she had just fortified her naturally strong constitution 
by a hearty supper of bacon and beans, washed down 
with black coffee, she only glanced up smilingly as Billy 
thrust his head out of the darkness and said : 

“Oh, is it you, Billy? Why, come in, then.” 

She seemed in the very best of spirits, and he was glad 
of that, for he had half feared to find her pale and shaken 
as he had seen her last. So he came in smiling too, with 
his hat in his hand, stumbling over the ill-constructed 
threshold and grasping at a chair to keep from falling. 
He was a very awkward man. Maria laughed aloud. 
There was no consciousness of embarrassing memories 
in her voice as she said : 


17 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


258 

“I b’lieve ye git boots three-four sizes too big jesi a 
purpose to stumble over things ! ” 

Billy twirled his hat round and round on his finger, still 
smiling. 

“It ain’t a question o’ boots altogether, Mariar,” he 
said, with quiet humor. “The man inside o’ ’em ’s the 
principal thing. ” 

“Don’t ye go to recommending yourself, now,” she 
continued, shaking her head and arranging her sewing 
in her lap. 

“Well, then, I’ll det the moon do the recommendin’ 
fer me,” he answered. “See how bright it shines out 
there on the water ! ye can jes’ see a long line o’ light 
flashin’ through the trees where the river is. I wonder 
how many times I’ve asked ye to go out there walkin’ 
with me sense we met early in the spring ? ” 

“A good many,” replied Maria, gently. 

“Come! put up yer work ’n’ let’s go out for a little 
while. Lor ! the walks we’ve had out there together ! I 
ain’t had a chance to talk to ye fer a age ! Ye don’t know 
how good the night feels ’n’ how big V white the moun- 
tains look. Ye’ve been in the house all day, I bet, ’n’ 
it’ll do ye all sorts o’ good to git a whiff of fresh air.” 

Maria laid aside her sewing carefully. 

“Yes,” she answered, “ I’ve been in the house all day, 
fer they was a big washin’ to do ’n’ ma ’s been uncommon 
bad besides. She’s in bed now, ’n’ dad’s out som’ers. 
Maud Eliza’s tryin’ to read a dime novel by candle-light 
in the woodshed. She’s took to that lately. I reckon I’d 
like a walk.” 

And the two passed out under the clear evening sky. 

It was a lovely night. The air was full of stars, poised 
and tremulous ; they are bubbles blown from God’s mouth. 
The mountains were piled up against the sky, like thun- 
derheads, The full moon swung over the far white 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


259 


summits, a burnished silver disk, and the milky way with 
the stars in its wake looked like a wreath of'pale smoke 
alive with sparks. 

“Ye’d better take my arm,” said Billy, though he knew 
that she would refuse. 

Maria laughed. 

“ If ye’d a seen the washin’ I done to day,” she cried, 
and the moonlight flashed across her smiling lips and 
white teeth, “I recken ye wouldn’t think I’m too weak 
to walk alone. No, no, Billy ; keep yer arm for some 
gal ’t needs it. I’d ruther walk by myself. Ye don’t 
know how how strong I be ; w’y, I’m a reg’lar hoss o’ a 
wooman ! ” 

“ Hosses needs a man to take care o’ em, the strongest 
o’ em,” remarked Billy, slyly. 

“ Maria frowned. 

“Well, /don’t ! ” she declared with emphasis. 

“Let’s set down here by the river,” said he, “where 
we’ve sat so many times ’n’ where we can see the moon- 
light on the water. How ’t darts ’n’ changes ’n’ flashes ! 
It dazzles my eyes. There ! be ye comf table ? ” He laid 
his big hand caressingly on her shoulder a moment. ‘ ‘ I’d 
like ye to be comf’table, alius,” he added in a lower voice. 

He had not meant to speak or act with more than 
brotherly tenderness, but he was conscious ©f having 
done so, and resolved to be more careful. HeAvould not 
cause her pain for the world. 

Both sat silent for some time, listening to the w r aterand 
looking up dreamily at the stars. At last Maria stirred 
and spoke slowly. 

“D’ye know, Billy, I’ve got lately so ’t I love the sky 
most ’s well ’s I do the waters. I never watch the stars 
come out ’without thinkin’ o’ when they fust appeared in 
the sky ’n’ no one was there to see ’em. I wonder if 
they shone ’s bright then ’s what they do now ? ” 


260 /Y THE VALLEY OF HA VlLAH. 

“God was there ! ” said Billy, solemnly, with his eyes 
fixed upon the heavens. 

She had been sitting with her chin propped upon her 
hand, and she turned her face toward him quickly with 
her head slightly lifted. 

“Ye alius understood me better ’n anybody else,” she 
said, softly. “ I don’t see how ye do it.” 

The kindly appreciation in her words and voice over- 
mastered his resolve to keep silent concerning himself. 
He said in a low, husky tone : 

“I hope ye ain’t sot ag’in’ me, Mariar ? I hope ye 
ain’t got nothin’ ag’in’ me more’n my ill looks ’n’ awk’ard 
ways ? ” 

“ No, Billy, ’tain’t that; don’t ye think it. I ain’t got 
the fust thing ag’in’ ye — not the fust thing. Don’t I know 
ye’re the kindest, best o’ men ? Ain’t I got every reason 
to think so ? ” She reached out and laid her hand on his, 
but directly a tremor passed through his frame and the 
hand she held glided uncertainly from her touch. “Don’t 
I know ye’re honest ’n’ brave ’n’ true — that ye’d willin’ly 
give up yer happiness fer mine — yer life fer mine, if they 
was need o’ it ?” 

He listened as reverently as if to some one praying. 

“ Ay, gladly ! ” she heard him mutter under his breath. 

“ I know it,” she went on, reaching out again for his 
hand, which he again drew away as if some restless, con- 
tradictory impulse made him repellen.t of the very friend- 
ship which he craved. ‘ ‘ But I don’t love ye — not that 
way, Billy — ’n’ that’s the long ’n’ short o’ it. I told ye 
wunst, the las' time I saw ye. I like ye as a friend — 
don’t ye see the dif’rence ? ” 

“ Yes, I see,” was the scarcely audible answer. 

She could not repress a rising irritation at his compliant 
words and remote, unheeding looks. 

“ Then what makes ye do it ?” she cried, impelled to 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


261 


a momentary fault-finding where she wished to be tender. 

“ How many times do ye have to be told ? Ye know I 
don’t like it. Ye know I hate it. What makes ye do it, 

I say ? ” 

“ Seems like I couldn’t help it this wunst,” he said. 
Then, after a long pause, he turned to her again, and the 
reflection of the light from the water was still in his 
eyes. “ But I won’t do it ag’in, I promise ye that. Be 
a little easy with me this wunst, my gal. I won’t do it 
ag’in.” 

She looked at him with a sort of cold wonder. All the 
gaiety with which he had met her was gone, and his face 
looked so drawn and old and white. 

“Ye ain’t mad at me, Billy?” she questioned, half 
timidly. It was not anger that his face expressed, but she 
could not imagine what else it could be. “ I’d like to be 
friends with ye. Ye’ve been very good to me.” 

“ Mad at ye ? No, no ! I ain’t made at ye,” he re- 
turned, quickly. “ How could ye think o’ sech a thing ? 
How could I be mad at ye ? Ye’re the best gal in the 
world, ’n fit fer the best o’ everything ; ’n’ it’s very good 
o’ ye — more ’n’ I deserve — to want to be friends with a 
no-’count feller like me. ” 

He was staring at the water again in a spell-bound, 
unheeding way, which was neither self-absorbed nor 
rightly conscious of external things. Maria shivered. 
He looked so patient, so pitiful, so needy. Something of 
the real pathos of his great renunciation, of the life-long 
sorrow she had unwittingly caused him, must have flashed 
upon her, for she rose suddenly from her seat at his side 
and, flinging her arms above her head, burst into a pas- 
sion of self-reproachful tears. He was beside her in an 
instant and had drawn her to him, laying her head against 
his breast and soothing her with tender, broken words, as 
if she were a grieving child. She did not try to break 


262 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H 


away from him, but rather sought the touch of his hard, 
caressing hand. 

“ W’y, what ’ve I done ? ” he cried, smoothing her dis- 
ordered hair. “ What a beast I am to make ye cry so ! 
There, there, there, my gal. Don’t cry — don’t cry. See, 
ye’ll make a fool o’ me, Mariar. How can I help cryin’, 
too, when ye take on so? Don’t cry, there’s my good 
gal. There ! Dry yer eyes ’n' don’t cry. ” 

He soothed her thus till gradually her sobs subsided, 
and she looked into his face with the tears still heavy on 
her long lashes. 

“ I couldn’t help it,” she whispered, still clinging to 
him. “Ye looked so deathly still ’n’ white. Oh, Billy, 
Billy, can ye ever fergive me ? I wish, ” she cried, break- 
ing away from him a little way but still holding his hands, 
“ I wish ye was my brother, then this ’ud never a-hap- 
pened ’n’ things ’ud be jes’ ’s they orter be. ’N’ how 
comf ’table we could live together ! ” 

“ I’ll be yer brother — anything ye like — only don’t cry 
no more. It kills me to see ye in trouble. There ! that’s 
right. Now let’s set down ’n’ talk like brother ’n’ sister. 
That’s what we air now, ye know. Only see ! ” and he 
looked at her with a pitiful, uncertain smile, “ ye’ve ’most 
made me cry, too ! ” 

He placed her gently on the bank and then seated him- 
self a little farther from her than he had been before, — so 
far that she could not reach out her hand and touch him 
again. 

“ I want to ask ye a question,” he said, presently. 
“ We’re brother ’n’ sister now,” he added, as if to remind 
her of his right to her friendship and confidence. 

“ Well ? ” said she. 

“Ye must answer it true and honest,” he continued. 
“ If I’m to be yer brother, ye must let me share yer 
troubles. ” 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVlLAH. 


263 

“Well ? ” she repeated. He thought her voice sounded 
a little anxious and afraid. He leaned toward her ear- 
nestly and reassuringly. 

“Ye needn’t be afeerd to tell me anything ’t ’s on yer 
mind, my dear. Who could keer fer ye more, or respect 
yer wishes stronger? All I want is fer ye to be happy. 
Ye b’lieve that ? ” 

“ Yes,” was the faint response. 

“ Then answer me.” He leaned forward and looked 
into her face with his big, penetrating eyes, while his 
voice rang out with a sort of massive seriousness. 

“ D’ye keer fer Jim Hulse, Mariar, in the way — ’t ye 
don’t keer fer me ? ” There was only one little pause in 
his rapid, decisive utterance of the words. “Ye said 
wunst ’t ye didn’t, but that might a-been afore ye knowed 
yer own mind. Answer me now.” 

She drew away from him as from something super- 
natural. 

“ Tell me,” he urged. 

She hid her face in her apron, but his voice pursued, 
and she felt that he was leaning eagerly toward her in the 
moonlight. 

“ Tell me,” he repeated, gently. 

He strained still further forward to catch the word 
which he knew would come. She drew a long inhala- 
tion, as if preparing for an outburst of passion. But she 
was silent for an instant. 

“Tell me, Maria,” said the gentle, pleading voice again, 

“Billy, Billy ! ” she cried, her long-pent-up soul leap- 
ing out in the stifled words, “how did ye know — how did 
ye guess ? I thought I’d kep’ it from everyone — almost 
from myself. Oh, Billy, if ye knowed how I’ve fought 

ag’in’ it — if ye knowed ” She broke off with a sudden 

choking sound in her voice. 

He arose and stood with his arms behind him. 


264 /AT THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 

“ I think I know — I think I understand” he said, with 
grave simplicity. 

She went on more calmly : 

“ I fought so hard ag’in’ it. I tried so hard not to think 
o’ him — so hard to drive him out o’ my mind and make 
myself free the way I was afore. But his eyes follered 
me ; they burned in the dark at me ; they scorched their- 
selves into my flesh ! ” She put her hand to her head in 
a frightened way, and went on rapidly : “It ’s a relief to 
tell how it was — it does me good. The fault was in my 
nater — I was alius afeerd o’ what I couldn’t understan’— 
afeerd o’ it ’n’ fascinated, like. It was so with the river 
'n’ the stars, don’t ye ’member ? ’N’ he was like them, 

only stronger, fuller o’ myst’ry. He clutched me and mas- 
tered me with his eyes. A look o’ his ’ud make me foller 
’im through fire ’n’ water. I loved ’im in spite o’ myself 
— I love ’im now. I’d give my soul fer one kind word 
from ’im.” She ended with a sob, and hid her face again 
in her apron. 

Billy unclasped his hands from behind him, and drew 
himself erect. 

“ I knowed it,” he said, very quietly. “ I’ve been 
keepin’ track o’ it ’thout knowin’ what I was doin’. It ’s 
all been made plain in the las’ few days. I knowed it was 
him — Jim Hulse.” 

She uncovered her face. It was all hot and crimson. 

“Ye made me tell ye ! ” she cried, almost resentfully. 

“Ye won’t be sorry fer trustin’ yer brother,” he said. 
“It ’ll be all right.” 

“Ye won’t tell nobody?” she asked, in sudden fear. 
“ Ye don't mean to tell nobody, Billy? Nobody knows 
but yerself — nobody in the world.” 

“ It’s all right,” was the answer. 

“ But ye won’t tell — promise me ye won’t tell 1 ” 

But he only repeated softly : 


W THE VALLEY OF HA V/LA Li. 


265 


“ It ’ll be all right — I’ll make it all right, my dear.” 

“I know ye’ll do as I want ye to,” she said. “I’d die 
o’ shame — I wouldn’t a-owned up if ye hadn’t made me ! ” 
’ she added, irritably. 

But he made nojeply. 

“ I’m goin’ home now,” she said, after a moment. 
“ I’ve made a fool o’ myself, ’n’ I hope ye’re satisfied! 
Ye needn’t trouble to go along o’ me. I’m tired, ’n’ I’d 
ruther be alone. I’ve had a hard day’s work.” 

Still he did not answer, but stood quite motionless, star- 
ing out at the restless water. With a movement of petu- 
lance, she turned from him and slipped away among the 
shadows, leaving him there with his own strange thoughts. 


266 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


CHAPTER XXXII. 

• 

The next morning Billy came to a resolution. Very 
early, before the sun was up, he started for Jim Hulse’s 1 
cabin. The light was just glancing above the eastern : 
hills as he entered the little enclosure, crossed the brook 
and went up to the open door. He knew that Hulsewas 
an early riser, and this morning, as he looked into the 
cabin, he saw its occupant busily engaged in washing his 
breakfast dishes. 

“ I’ll wait till ye git through, Jim,” said Billy, as Hulse 
looked up. “Then I wish ’t ye’d come out ’ere a minute. 
I’ve got suthin’ on my mind ’t I want to say to ye.” 

He walked down through the narrow opening of the 
enclosure and stood there, leaning against the cliffs, wait- 
ing for Hulse to come out. The light had strengthened. 
The eastern sky was full of clouds as delicately tinted as 
sprays of apple blossoms, and there was a long furrow of 
white across the blue dome from north to south. A little < 
in front of the rock against which he leaned, where the * 
shadows fell thickest, a few tall willows were just burst- ' 
ing into leaf, their dainty catkins showing like frostwork ^ 
against the clear window of the air. Billy heard the lisp- 
ing waters absently, and, after a few moments, turned 
back into the enclosure. The wild-plum blossoms were 
mostly fallen ; but a shivering scent of them was still in 
, the air. As he half stopped, looking up at the tree, a little 
bird alighted on one of the branches and commenced to * 
sing shrilly and gladly, every tiny feather quivering with 
the ecstatic earnestness of song. Billy regarded it curi- 
ously — the place had seemed so still a moment before. 

Presently Hulse came out, putting on his hat as he 


IN THE VALLEY OF H AVI L AIL 267 

came. Billy forgot all about the bird then, and moved a 
few steps toward his rival, who paused under the plum 
tree and regarded his visitor with narrow, all-seeing eyes. 
Billy placed his hands on his hips, according to an awk- 
ward habit of his, and stood quite silent. 

“ You have something to say to me ? ” asked Hulse, in 
his slow, emotionless voice. 

How deeply his eyes were set under those square, 
prominent brows, and how passionate and hopeless they 
looked, as if the coals of a devastated past still smoldered 
there and would not die out ! The mystery of this man’s 
life insisted itself in every glance and movement. His 
appearance was like the curtain of a theatre ; you longed 
to see behind it — to know the inmost workings of that 
tragic world. But the curtain of Jim Hulse’s soul was 
never lifted. The tragedy of crime or disappointment 
had been acted, as far as men knew, without a spectator. 
Billy could understand the influence of those eyes on 
Maria, for he, too, had been in a measure coerced by 
their mysterious authority. He felt awed, as if in the 
presence of a great sorrow or a shipwreck. Hulse’s mel- 
ancholy lay upon everything around him, like the shadow 
of a giant oak upon the green sward. 

Billy dug the toe of his great boot into the ground, try- 
ing to think of a way to begin ; then with a sudden back- 
ward jerk of his head, as if flinging off an embarrassment 
which was unworthy of the cause he had come to advocate, 
he burst forth with rough, incisive directness : 

“Ye know me, Jim Hulse ! Ye’ve knowed me a good 
many years now. I can joke ’n’ play the fool, n I ve 
done it often ; but when I say a thing in earnest I mean 
it. Ye b’lieve that? ” 

Hulse bowed. 

“Then, look here. I’ve loved Mariar Pugsley ever 
sence I sot eyes on ’er — loved ’er true ’n honorable, if 


268 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


ever man loved wooman so. If she needed my heart’s 
blood to make 'er happy, I'd pour it out fer 'er, quick 'n' 
joyful. That’s what I want, Jim — to see 'er happy. Buv 
she don’t keer fer me — not that way — she never can. 'N' 
I won’t worry ’er. I’ve found out she loves another man, 
'n' I want 'er to be happy with him, if sech a thing can 
be. I want him to marry ’er, no matter what ’comes o’ 
me ! ” 

He took off his shabby hat and wiped his forehead on 
his sleeve. 

“ Well?” said Hulse, without taking his eyes from the 
other’s face. 

It seemed to Billy that his statement had been explicit 
enough. 

“ Be ye a fool? ” he cried, in wrath. “ Can't ye guess 
the rest — can’t ye see? The man she loves is you, Jim 
Hulse ! Don’t ye understan’ ? ” 

Hulse’s sphinx-like face remained quite unmoved. Billy 
had expected it to become radiant with sudden joy. His 
anger gave place to amazement. Could it be that Hulse 
— that any man — found no delight in the prospect of 
Maria’s love ? Or was it only this hermit’s passive way 
of receiving the glad intelligence ? 

“I know ye’re prouder 'n Lucifer,” proceeded Billy, 
after waiting vainly for the other to speak. “ But yer a 
straight, fair man in yer deal, if ye be queer. ’N’ ye’re 
worthy o’ ’er, 's fur ’s / know.” His eyes softened and his 
voice lost its angry ring. “ We’ve been friends a long 
time, Jim. 'N' now I want ye to marry 'er ’n’ make 'er 
happy. She deserves it — she deserves the best o’ every- 
thing. I want ’er to be happy — she mus be — a wooman 
like 'er wa’n’t put into the world to be mis’able, like the 
rest o’ us.” 

Hulse gave a slow, downward glance at the rivulet at 
his feet, and when he looked up he was smiling, but not 


IN THE VALLE Y OF HA VILAH. 269 

with his customary sarcasm. Then he took a step for^ 
ward and held out his hand. Billy laid his palm in it, 
smiling, too. This was an easier victory than he had 
anticipated. 

“You are a hero, Billy Bling, ” said the strange man, 
and his usually indifferent tones were as earnest as the 
grasp of his strong, hard hand. “ A knight — a misplaced 
hero, born too late for the world to hear of, but none the 
worse for that. You prove to me that a man may live 
plainly yet think and feel in frescoes.” He laid his left 
hand on Billy’s shoulder and with his other he still 
grasped his visitors right. 

“ Ay, it is settled, then,” said Billy, trying to release 
his hand. But Hulse held it fast, and there was a look of 
further speech in his eyes. 

“ I am glad you came to me, Billy,” he said presently, 
and his voice was grave and deep. “ Such an example 
of unselfishness revives me ; but — it comes too late for 
me to profit by it. Listen ! ” Billy felt the fingers that 
held his hand stiffen as if turning into steel. “You make 
me respect you for the act of self-sacrifice you would like 
to perform, but — ” he flung away Billy’s hand with a 
force that left it hanging lax as if broken ; then he folded 
his long arms and stood erect, 1 ‘ but, with regard to the 
lady, — you must excuse me.” The old cynical smile 
flashed into his face ; he turned abruptly, and, without 
another word, entered the cabin, closing the door behind 
him. 

And Billy went out into the valley once more, and the 
sunshine was like blackness along his path. 

Next morning early he came again to Jim Hulse’s cabin. 
There were dark circles under his eyes, his face looked 
haggard and flaccid, his lips were drawn and pale. He 
leaned his rifle against the door-post and looked in. 

No one was there. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


“He’s prospectin’ up Snow Gulch,” said he, and. 
passed on. 

He found Hulse at work with pick and shovel, digging J 
up the hard soil. 

“ I’ve come ag’in, Jim,” he said, leaning on his gun. . 
“ We’ll have that biz’ness settled this time. I’ve fetched! 
my rifle along, ye see. ” 

Hulse looked up with a faint little smile, — almost of 
gladness. Billy had never seen him smile like that before. 

“ I’m glad to see you, Billy,” laying down his shovel i 
and leaning against a rock. “ I’ve expected you, longed 
for you, but I thought you would come in the conven- j 
tional form, with a grin on your face and a scythe in your 
hand. No matter — the gun will do. • You’re welcome. 
What are you going to do ? ” 

“ I thought about it all las’ night,” replied Billy, pass- 
ing his hand across his forehead in a tired way. “ I 
didn’t sleep a wink — I couldn’t. ’N’ I’ve come to a con- f 
elusion, Jim, ’n’ it’s this : the man ’t refuses to marry 
Mariar Pugsley ’n’ make ’er happy — she’s worthy o’ the I 
best, I tell ye ! — don’t deserve to live. He deserves to 
die, — he’s got to die. Not but what he may be a square! 
man — I won’t say nothin’ ag’in’ ’im — but he’s got to die, { 
’n’ I’m the man to kill ’im. I’m ’er brother, Jim — I’m ’erl 
brother!” His voice rose despairingly. “Who else ’si 
she got to look to fer justice ? I’ve come a-purpose to 
shoot ye. That’s what I’m here fer. I must have yer 
life.” 

Hulse smiled more broadly than before. He did not 
shift his position in the least, but regarded his companion' 
with a look of mingled pity and admiration. 

“ You show poor taste, Billy,” he said at last, “ to take 
from me the least valuable of my possessions. If you had 
chosen to rob me of my Homer, now — but no matter.” 
He pushed himself away from the rock and stood erect, 


IN THE VALLE V OF HA VILAH. 


271 

“We’ve been friends for a long time, Billy,” he said. 
“ There’s no need of our being enemies now.” 

“ I d’ know ’s we need be enemie's,” replied Billy, dog- 
gedly, fumbling with his gun. “ But bein’ friends with 
me won’t save ye. Ye’ve got to die.” 

“ I didn’t mean that. I meant that dying by the hand 
of a friend is a better end than I expected to make. Very 
well ; we are friends, then ? ” 

“Yes, if ye mean it that way.” 

“ But you intend to give me a chance, too ? You 
don’t mean that you are to do all the killing yourself — that 
I am to stand up like a stick to be shot at and knocked 
over ? ” 

Billy passed his hand over his forehead again and 
closed his eyes as if trying to collect his thoughts. 

“ That’s what I meant to do,” he said, finally. “ But 
I hadn’t thought it out right on both sides. I see now — 
I see that wouldn’t be fair.” 

“You might regret it afterwards,” said Hulse, almost 
affably, as he shouldered his tools. “ Come up to my 
cabin and I’ll get my rifle, too. We want the thing done 
fairly on both sides.” 

“ We can do the biz’ness there ’s well ’s anywheres,” 
assented Billy, and the two men passed out of the cool 
shadows of Snow Gulch under the great, empty sky. 

They reached the cabin in a few minutes and Hulse 
deposited his pick and shovel in a corner of the room. 
“ They’ll do for some other poor devil,” he muttered, 
without looking back at them. Then he shouldered his 
rifle, cast a glance at the row of books above the table, 
and, in a moment more, the two men were on their way 
toward the river, shoulder to shoulder, stepping evenly, 
crushing the grasses and flowers under their heavy tread. 

For a little time the birds and the winds were silent as 
if in awe of a dread event ; only the river was audible, 


272 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


filling the landscape with a whirling inundation of sound, 
The valley looked awed and solemn. Surely, man is less 
the image of God than are the rocks, the rivers and the 
trees ! 

“Stand ’ere,” said Billy. “I’ll go over there by the 
cottonwood. That’s ’bout the right distance, ain’t it ? ” 
And he pointed with his gun. 

“Shake hands first, friend,” said Hulse. And the two 
men stood with their hands clasped, looking into each 
other’s eyes. 

“ How loud the water roars — d’ye hear it ? ” cried Billy, 
and Hulse nodded. “ It throbs in my head — it shakes the 
trees ’n’ the sky.” 

They gained their places, and Hulse shouted so that 
Billy could hear him above the roar of the river : 

“Aim straight at my heart, now ! Fair play is the word 
— for both of us ! ” 

“Ay — ay — fair play ! ” came back the answer above the 
flood of dizzy sound. 

And the river thundered and sent its numbness through 
the brains of the two men. 

They raised their rifles. 

“ One — two — three — ” 

It was Hulse who counted^ 

There were two flashes, two reports. 

One wavering instant and Billy saw his antagonist lying 
among the sweet spring grasses, with a bullet in his heart. 
And he himself was standing alone by the cottonwoods, 
uninjured, untouched. And the river sounded on. 

All sounds from the unseen shore of life are lost in the 
noise of the loud waters 1 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


273 


CHAPTER XXXIII. 

All that day Billy remained near the spot where the duel 
had taken place. Two or three times he walked a little 
way up the river, but he soon came back as if realizing 1 
the uselessness of attempting to break away from the 
place. He had taken off his hat, not so much to cool his 
head, as to ease himself of a great weight which pressed 
against his brain, and crushed all power of thought out of 
it. The sun beat remorselessly upon his face, but without 
bringing anything of color into his wan, fallen cheeks. 
He had torn his shirt collar wide apart, and the blood in 
the big veins at his throat throbbed madly, but with a 
strange, dizzying coldness which poured the numbness of 
paralysis into his thoughts. Several times he had ap- 
proached the body of the dead man and gazed upon it fix- 
edly, as if to photograph the picture upon his soul for 
eternity ; and when he walked away from it, he had a 
way of steadying himself, as if bracing his mind to look 
at something horrible that still lay before him on the grass. 
Time and again, after glaring at a certain spot with wide, 
unwinking eyes, he turned away shudderingly as if to 
avoid contact with a visible horror, and took a direction 
at right angles to his former path. But at night when the 
sun had finally set, and he could resist the fascination that 
held him near that set white face, he left the spot and 
went slowly up the valley to his own cabin. Then he 
lighted a candle and opened a drawer in the rough deal 
table, and took out a folded paper. He examined it care- 
fully as if to make sure that it was what he wanted. 

“ I’m glad I made it out afore Jim Hulse refused to do 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


2 74 

what I asked o' ’im,” he muttered. “I don’t believe I 
could write it now.” 

Then he went out into the night once more, leaving the 
candle burning. 

The wind had played with his unkempt hair at will, and 
when he presented himself at the door of the Pugsley 
cabin, where he found the old lady alone, he looked so 
haggard, so wild, in the dim light that Mrs. Pugsley gave 
a shrill scream of terror at sight of him and, without al- 
lowing him to enter or even speak, told him that Maria 
had gone for a walk by the river, and that he had better 
go at once and find her. He turned from the door dully 
without a word. In spite of the numbness in his head, 
he knew perfectly well where he would find her by the 
river. 

The world had a veiled look to his eyes. The moon 
was shining, but its beams were uncertain, and the stars 
glimmered through thin clouds, like women’s eyes through 
shreds of gauze. As he passed under the cottonwoods, he 
stopped a moment and looked wistfully up among the 
still branches ; and suddenly the moon came out from be- 
hind a cloud and the light fluttered down through the 
branches like myriad white-winged birds. 

“ I wish it ’ud stay so,” he muttered, folding his arms 
and staring up at the full, round disk. ‘ ‘ I didn’t use to 
care ; but now — I hate the dark — ’n’ I hate the daylight, 
too.” But even as he spoke a great white cloud surged 
across the moon like a foaming wave, and the light was 
gone. 

And he went on toward the river, muttering to himself. 

“ Whatever the preachers may say life is wuth,” he 
said, “ it ain’t wuth livin’.” And the river repeated the 
words far and near. 

He found Maria, as he had expected, sitting in the old 
place on the fallen log by the water, Her hands were 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


275 


loosely clasped in her lap, and her sun-bonnet lay on the 
grass at her feet. He stood watching her a long time 
before she was aware of his presence. 

But again the moon came out, flinging the slim shad- 
ows of reeds out upon the water*. It threw his own 
shadow at her feet, and, when he saw that she noticed it, 
he moved softly forward and stood before her. 

“ W’y, Billy ! ” she cried, startled in spite of herself at 
sight of his altered face and manner. “Ye come like a 
ghost out o’ the shadders. What in the world ’ve ye been 
doin’ to make ye look so ? Where ’ve ye been ? ’N’ 

wher’s yer hat? ” 

He came still farther forward, and tried to smile at her 
easily and reassuringly — such a wan, piteous, tremulous 
smile ! His eyes were filmed with a dead lustre which 
seemed like an interposition of something tangible be- 
tween his thoughts and whatever he fastened his gaze 
upon. 

“ I’m all right,” he said, not heeding her questions. 
“ Don’t ye see? Ye needn’t be afeerd o’ me. Nothin’ ’s 
the matter. Look ! my hand don’t shake, does it?” He 
held his hand out where the light could fall upon it. “Ye 
mustn’t think anything ’s wrong with me or — or be afeerd 
o’ me. I reckon I’ll set down,” he added. “ I’m ruther 
tired.” She made a place for him on the log at her side, 
but he turned away hastily. “ Not there ! ” he said, in a 
fearful whisper. Then, recollecting himself, “I — I’d 
ruther set ’ere, if ye don’t mind.” 

“ Oh, I don’t mind,” she answered. “Only the grass 
is damp, ’n’ ye may ketch cold.” 

He burst into shrill, unnatural laughter. 

“ That ’ud be too bad ! I’m sech a dellycut creeter — 
poor little feller! What if I’d ketch cold ’n’ die?” He 
stopped laughing as abruptly as he had begun, and sat 
quite still a few moments, occasionally moistening his 


276 TN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 

dry lips with his tongue and rubbing them with the back 
of his hand. 

“The river ain’t so noisy to-night,” he went on, after a 
while, staring out at the tossing water. “Don’t ye think 
it ’s quieter ’n it was this mornin’? Or didn’t ye notice 
how it roared ! I hate the sound o’ it when it fills my 
head ’n’ drowns my thoughts, ’n’ shakes the clouds all up 
with the sun.” 

She had regarded him so long as her best friend that it 
had become a habit to think of him as one who would 
avert danger from her rather than precipitate it. Had 
any one but Billy looked and talked so she would have 
felt genuine alarm. 

“ The nights are alius quiet ’ere,” was all she said. 

“ Yes. ’N’ I heerd ye say wunst ye liked to see the 
stars come out one by one — d’ye ’member? See, they’re 
all out now. ’N’ the evenin’ — to-night it come like the 
benediction after singin’. Only it was a bad day, ’n’ I 
hate the dark. I hate itwuss ’n what I do broad daylight. 
D’ye ’member the benediction, Mariar?” 

“Yes, I ’member,” she answered, moving a little away 
from him. 

“ They used to say benediction jes' afore meetin’ was 
out, back there in Ohio,” he continued, dreamily. * “ ’N’ 
the beeches outside the winder stood up straight ’n’ tall 
’n’ still.” 

Then he was silent again for a long time, gazing out at 
the dimly-lighted landscape and restlessly pulling up the 
grass by the roots and fumbling with it on his knees. 

How quiet, yet how instinct with life the spring night 
was ! Maria realized it with a sense of incongruity. The 
air was full of the growth and aspiration which thrills all 
things when young buds no longer nestle quietly, but 
spread their wings to the soft air. The near river was a 
continuous ripple of song. 


IN THE VALLEY OF H AVILA H. 


277 


“ This life — this life ! ” he muttered, turning toward her 
and clasping his big hands, still full of grass, around his 
knee. Then creeping forward with a stealthy, gliding 
movement, he peered into her face, and whispered, with 
a frown : “D’ye know what it means, Mariar — I say, d’ye 
know what life means ? ” 

“ W’y,” she answered, frightened at last, “ to me it 
means a chance to do my duty by mother — nothin’ more. ” 

He seized her wrist and held her in a grasp that made 
her moan. 

“ No more ? ” he cried, in a repressed voice. “No more 
hi that? Listen ! I'll tell ye. I’ve been thinkin’ o’ it all 
day.” His lips were now close to her ear, and his voice 
struck her cheek like a sting. “ It means a chance to git 
ready fer hell ! ” And he flung her hand away and sunk 
back upon the grass, scowling and muttering. 

“Ye ain’t yerself, Billy, or ye wouldn’t a-hurt me like 
that,” she complained, rubbing her hand where he had 
clutched it. “Ye’ve told me over ’n’ over agin’ ’t ye love 
me, but ye can’t keer fer me or ye wouldn’t give me pain. 
Love ’s a sweet ’n’ tender thing, Billy. It never harms.” 

He laughed hoarsely, scattering the broken grasses over 
his knees. 

“Ay,” he said, “I understand that Love ’s a tender 
thing, a sweet thing, sweeter ’n what life is, but — ” here 
he smiled strangely, “not ’s sweet s 'death. Ye needn’t 
fear me, Mariar, I wouldn’t harm ye fer the world. 
Don’t go. I’ve got some news fer ye. I saw Jim Hulse 
this mornin.’ ” 

She did not reply, but settled back on the log from 
which she had partly risen, and he knew that she was 
listening. 

“I recken ye’d like to know how he gits along all by 
hisself down there.” He gave his head a jerk in the di- 
rection of Hulse’s cabin. 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


278 

Her head drooped till her eyes were hidden. 

“ Ye’ve been tellin’ ’im,” she whispered. 

“They ain’t nothin’ the matter o’ me,” he went on, un. 
heedingly. “See, my hand ’s stiddy, ain’t it? It don’t 
shake, does it ? I’m all right Only my head goes wrong 
when I try to think o’ some things — not o’ that ; it ’s clear 
nough when I think o’ that! But a while ago when I 
tried to ’member a piece o’ poetry I learned when I was 
a boy, — suthin’ ’bout a busy bee ’n’ a openin’ flower,- — I 
couldn’t make head nor tail o’ it My thoughts git sort 
o’ twisted ’n’ crooked sometimes ; that’s all. It ain’t 
much. I’m ruther tired.” He drew his knees up to his 
chin in a grotesque fashion and clasped his arms around 
them. 

“Ye don’t know what a day I’ve had o’ it ; ye can’t 
have no idee. Yes, I saw ’im this mornin’. He was 
quiet — my God ! how white ’n’ still he was with the sun 
a-shinin’ in his open eyes ! I was goin to tetch ’im, — I 
was goin’ to drag ’im back out o’ the sun, but the blood 
ran out o’ his heart, ’n’ his eyes flared, ’n’ his teeth threat- 
ened, ’n’ I didn’t dare. He’s layin’ up there amongst the 
lilies now — mebbe the coyotes are at him by this time.” 

She had sprung forward and was shaking him by the 
shoulders as if trying to awaken a man who was talking 
in his sleep. “ Billy — Billy — Billy ! — ” she repeated the 
word in a hoarse, whispered shriek, but he neithernoticed 
nor looked at her. 

“I staid aroun’ there all day tryin’ to keep ’em off. 
They’re' devils, them coyotes — ’s bad ’s wolves. ’ N ’ they 
was a buzzard I had to fight. It tried to tear his eyes. 
I beat it off with my gun, but it come back time ’n’ ag’in. 
I’d a shot it, only my gun was empty, — I think the hell- 
ish bird knew. I used the charge early in the mornin’, 
’n’ I didn’t have no more, — I didn’t think I’d need no 
more. I wish ’t I could a-got the cussed bird in my 


IN THE VALLEY OF HA VILA H. 


* 79 

hands. I’d a-wrung its neck slow 'n' stiddy — like that — 
jes' to hear it scream while its bones cracked. Ye don't 
know how it looks to see one o' them brutes fightin’ 
to pick out a dead man's eyes ! ' N' I couldn’t use Jim’s 

gun, nuther. That was empty too. He fired, but he 
missed me. I reckon he done it o’ purpose. But my 
aim was sure. I aimed at his heart, 's I told 'im to aim at 
mine. The mark was so plain as he stood there in the sun- 
shine. I could a-hit it a mile away. 'N' we wasn't fur 
apart. So I fired : 'n' the hills rocked, 'n' I saw 'im heave 
'n' fall, ’n’ the earth shook. He was so full o’ blood fer a 
thin man, Maria ! It ran out over everything, over the* 
grass ’n’ the lilies, it filled the river, it splashed the hills, 
it soaked the sky ! ” His voice died out in a long exha- 
lation of horror and he covered his face with his hands. 
Maria had stopped shrieking. She bent over him, yet 
straining away from him, her hands wrenched apart in her 
apron, her eyes riveted upon him. 

At last he raised his head again and met her eyes. 

“ It was all for you, Maria," he said. “ I told 'im' what 
I’d found out — how ye keered fer 'im' — 'n' asked 'im to 
marry ye 'n' make ye happy. That’s what I wanted, was 
to see ye happy, it didn't matter 'bout me. How could I 
tell it 'ud turn out so bad ? I thought he’d be glad — 's 
glad 's I'd a-been in his place. But he went into the cabin 
'n' shet the door on me. I don't 'member jest his words — 
V I killed 'im. What else could I do ? It wa'nt right — 
I don't pertend to say ’t was — it ’ud a-been all right if both 
o’ us was dead. It was all fer you, Mariar ; he didn’t 
deserve to live, after that \ ” 

She stood up straight above him now. Looking up at 
her, he thought her head must touch the stars. 

“ * N ’ ye reely done all that ? ’’ 

He nodded, still fumbling with the grass and twisting 
it in and out among his fingers. 


2 8o 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAV/LAH. 


Her eyes flashed. Anger and scorn took possession of 
her after the first cold horror was past. 

“The man I love is dead,” she cried. “But you are 
alive! Ye took good keer o’ that ! I wonder the words 
don’t blister yer mouth when ye say ’em ! ” 

He looked at her with a slow comprehension of her 
meaning. 

“I didn’t do it thinkin’ ye’d take up with me, my dear,” 
he said, humbly. “’Fore God, I didn’t ; I never thought 
o’ that. He agreed to shoot me too ; it was a bargain 
atween us. He said he’d aim fer my heart — ’n’ he didn’t 
keep his word.” , 

She turned away with a gesture of loathing and he 
stretched out his hands to her from the ground. 

“Don’t be too hard on a man,” he pleaded. “ I know 
it wa’nt right — I don’t ask ye to fergive me. But I don’t 
reckin my head was quite straight — it hain’t been, lately. 
’N’ the river was so loud I couldn’t think. I know they 
ain’t no excuse fer me, — I know, I know ! ” He crawled 
on his hands and knees after her, trying to clutch her 
dress as she moved away. Then, rambling vaguely in 
his speech. “Don’t be too hard on a man. The good 
Lord created us all ” 

“’N' how He must a’ stared when He created a thing 
lik ejyou ! ” she flashed back in scorn. 

With an effort he swallowed something in his throat, 
and when he spoke again his voice was even and quiet. 

“I s’pected this,” he said. “Ye’re right ’n’ just, ’s 
ye alius be. I know I deserved it ’n’ I come prepared. 
We can’t even be brother ’an’ sister no more, Mariar — 
that’s over, too. I’ve wronged ye, my dear, wuss ’n’ 
any woman was ever wronged afore. I don’t ask ye to 
fergive me — God Hisself can’t fergive sech a deed — so 
how can you ? But I’ll do what I can — I’ll do what I 
can. I come prepared fer it. I’mgoin’now. Ye’ll never 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVTLAH. 28 1 

see me ag’in. Hate me asl deserve — hate me alius; it’ll 
be my greatest punishment here ’n’ in hell ! ” 

He was gone, and she stood under the cottonwoods 
alone. The moon shone. The long valley looked like a 
vitreous sea, burnished by the white light, and the river 
glided softly past, like a soul that fears. 

When Maria reached the cabin after long wandering 
under the cottonwoods, she found her mother and Maud 
Eliza listening with big eyes to Ephraim, who was reading 
a written scrawl by the light of the guttering candle. 

“ Somebody throwed it into the door ! ” he cried, excit- 
edly, as soon as Maria entered the room. “ I couldn’t see 
who. It must a-been Billy — Billy Bling ! Have ye seen 
’im to-night, Mariar? I passed ’im a while ago ’n’ he 
looked dredful — like the breakin’-up o’ a hard winter. Have 
ye quarTd with ’im ? Lord what a blessin’ — what a com- 
fort my ’quaintance with that feller’s been ! why look ’ere — 
only think ! He says in this ’ere paper ’t he’s goin’ to skip 
the kentry ’n’ wants ye ’n’ the other feller — that must mean 
me ! — to be happy, so he leaves that new strike o’ his — 
the bigges' gold find o’ the age, Mariar ! — well, who in the 
name o' heaven, d’ye think he leaves it to ? W’y to you, my 
gal, to you! Come ’ere this minnit ’n’ embrace yer lovin’ 
father ’t ’s alius done his part by ye ’n’ deserve well o’ ye ! 
To Mariar, ole woman, d’ye hear ? To Mariar, Maud Elizy, 
d’ye hear ? Think o’ that ! It ’s wuth millions, Mariar, — its 
wuth millions, ole woman ! — Maud Elizy, set a bench fer 
yer sister. ’N’ I’ll drink champagne when whiskey tastes 
stale, ’n’ learn to play billiards, ’n’ ride in the street car, 
’n’ wear button shoes, ’n’ — oh, Lord ! mebbe we’ll all go 
to Yurrup along o’ the rest o’ the ton ey folks down to 
’Frisco, ’n’ have green peas in February.” 

“’N’ we’ll git out o’ this ’ere place to wunst,” croaked 
the old woman in raven-like tones, sitting up on the lounge 
and adjusting her cap, which looked more startled than 


282 


IN THE VALLEY OF HAVILAH. 


ever. “’N’ we’ll go right down to ’Frisco r n' buy a house 
on Nob Hill, ’n’ I’ll take my sofy along o’ me — mind that, 
Ephraim ! — ’n’ I’ll have cardinal stockin’s ’n’ individool 
salt-cellars ’s a Swipes should, ’n’ be looked up to as the 
fat o’ the land. Eh, Mariar ? ’’ 

But Maria answered nothing. She turned her face 
away from the light and wept. 


THE END. 



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